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CROWN   THEOLOGICAL   LIBRARY 


VOL.   XL. 
GARDNER'S   THE    EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 


Crown  Ubeological  Xtbran? 


WORKS  ALREADY  PUBLISHED 


Vol.  I.— BABEL  AND  BIBLE.     By  Dr  Friedrich  Delitzsch. 
Vol.  II.— THE  VIRGIN  BIRTH  OF  CHRIST.     By  Paul  Lobstein. 
Vol.  III.— MY    STRUGGLE    FOR    LIGHT.      By  R.  Wimmer. 
Vol.  IV.— LIBERAL  CHRISTIANITY.     By  Jean  Reville. 
Vol.  V.— WHAT  IS  CHRISTIANITY?     By  Adolf  Harnack. 
Vol.  VI.— FAITH  AND  MORALS.    By  W.  Herrmann. 
Vol.  VII.— EARLY  HEBREW  STORY.     By  John  P.  Peters,  D.D. 
Vol.  VIII.— BIBLE  PROBLEMS.    By  Prof.  T.  K.  Cheyne,  D.D. 
Vol.    IX.— THE    DOCTRINE   OF   THE   ATONEMENT     AND     ITS     HIS- 
TORICAL EVOLUTION,  and  RELIGION  AND  MODERN  CULTURE. 
By  the  late  Auguste  Sabatier. 
Vol.  X.— THE  EARLY  CHRISTIAN  CONCEPTION  OF  CHRIST  :     Its  Sig- 
nificance and  Value  in  the  History  of  Religion.    By  Otto  Pfleiderer. 
Vol.  XL— THE  CHILD  AND  RELIGION.     Essays  by  Various  Writers. 
Vol.  XII.— THE   EVOLUTION   OF   RELIGION.     By   Dr   L.   R.    Farnell. 
Vol.  XIII.— THE     BOOKS     OF     THE     NEW    TESTAMENT.       By    Baron 

Hermann  von  Soden,  D.D. 
Vol.  XIV.— JESUS.     By  W.  Bousset. 
Vol.  XV.-THE  COMMUNION   OF   THE   CHRISTIAN  WITH  GOD.     By 

W.  Herrmann.     Revised  and  much  enlarged  Edition. 
Vol.  XVI. -HEBREW  RELIGION.     By  W.  E.  Addis,  M.A. 
Vol.  XVII.— NATURALISM   AND  RELIGION.     By  Rudolf  Otto. 
Vol.  XVIII— ESSAYS  ON  THE  SOCIAL  GOSPEL.     By  Dr  Adolf  Harnack 

and  Dr  Herrmann. 
Vol.  XIX.— RELIGION   OF  THE  OLD  TESTAMENT.      By  Karl  Marti. 
Vol.    XX— LUKE  THE  PHYSICIAN.     By  Dr  Adolf  Harnack. 
Vol    XXI.-THE  HISTORICAL  EVIDENCE  FOR  THE  RESURRECTION 

OF  JESUS  CHRIST.     By  Prof.  Kirsopp  Lake. 
Vol.  XXII.— THE    APOLOGETIC    OF     THE     NEW    TESTAMENT.      By 

"~    E.  F.  Scott. 
Vol.  XXIII. —THE  SAYINGS  OF  JESUS.     By  Dr  Adolf  Harnack. 
Vol.  XXIV.— ANGLICAN  LIBERALISM.     By  Twelve  Churchmen. 
Vol.  XXV— THE     FUNDAMENTAL    TRUTHS    OF    THE    CHRISTIAN 

RELIGION.     By  Dr  R.  Seeberg. 
Vol.  XXVI.— THE  LIFE  OF  THE  SPIRIT.     By  Dr  Rudolf  Eucken. 
Vol.  XXVII.— THE  ACTS  OF  THE  APOSTLES.     By  Dr  Adolf  Harnack. 
Vol.  XXVIII.— MONASTICISM     AND      THE      CONFESSIONS      OF     ST 

AUGUSTINE.     By  Dr  Adolf  Harnack. 
Vol.  XXIX.— MODERNITY  AND  THE   CHURCHES.      By  Professor  Percy 

Gardner. 
Vol   XXX.— THE  OLD   EGYPTIAN    FAITH.     By  Prof.  Edouard  Naville. 
Vol   XXXI. -THE  CONSTITUTION  AND  LAW   OF   THE   CHURCH   IN 

THE  FIRST  TWO  CENTURIES.     By  Dr  Adolf  Harnack. 
Vol.  XXXII.— THE  SCIENTIFIC  STUDY  OF  THE  OLD  TESTAMENT. 

By  Dr  Rudolf  Kittel. 
Vol.  XXXIII.— THE   DATE   OF   THE   ACTS   AND    OF   THE   SYNOPTIC 

GOSPELS.     By  Dr  Adolf  Harnack. 
Vol.  XXXIV— THE  RELIGIOUS  EXPERIENCE  OF  ST  PAUL.'    By  Prof. 

Percy  Gardner. 
Vol.  XXXV.— PHARISAISM:  ITS  AIMS  AND   ITS   METHODS.     By  Rev. 

P.  Travers  Herford. 
Vol.  XXXVL— BIBLE   READING    IN   THE    EARLY   CHURCH.       By   Dr 

Adolf  Harnack. 
Vol.  XXXVII.— PROTESTANTISM    AND    PROGRESS.     By  Prof.    Ernst 

Troei.tsch. 
Vol.  XXXVIII.— PRESENT-DAY  ETHICS.    By  Prof.  Rudolf  Eucken. 
Vol.  XXXIX.— KNOWLEDGE  AND  LIFE.     By  Prof.  Rudolf  Eucken. 
Vol.  XL.— THE  EPHESIAN  GOSPEL.     By  Prof.  Percy  Gardner. 
Descriptive  Prospectus  on  Application. 


THE 

EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 


BY 

PERCY  GARDNER,  Litt.D.,  F.B.A. 


^Blessed  are  they  that  have  not  seen  and 
yet  have  believed 


NEW  YORK:   G.   P.   PUTNAM'S  SONS 
LONDON:    WILLIAMS   &   NORGATE 

1915 


PREFACE 

In  1911  I  published  a  book  on  The  Religious 
Experience  of  St  Paul.  This  naturally  led 
me  on  to  study  more  carefully  the  greatest 
work  of  the  Pauline  School, — greater  even 
than  the  Epistle  to  the  Romans — the  Fourth 
or  Johannine  Gospel.  I  proceeded  on  the 
same  plan  which  I  had  adopted  in  studying 
St  Paul's  works.  First,  I  examined  in  detail 
the  Gospel  itself.  Then  I  wrote  a  sketch  of 
the  results  to  which  that  examination  led  me. 
Finally,  I  turned  to  the  modern  literature  on 
the  subject,  and  by  the  aid  of  it  corrected  and 
expanded  what  I  had  written.  I  consider  the 
work  of  Mr  E.  F.  Scott,  The  Fourth  Gospel, 
as  the  most  valuable  of  recent  works  on  the 
subject ;  and  I  have  usually,  though  of  course 
not  always,  found  his  view  in  accordance  with 
my  own. 

I  cannot  pretend  to  have  studied  the  litera- 
ture so  carefully  as  some  writers,  such  as  Dr 


vi  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

Sanday  or  Dr  Bacon.  My  work  aims  at 
being  suggestive  rather  than  exhaustive.  But 
as  my  little  book  on  St  Paul  was  in  many 
quarters  kindly  received,  I  hope  for  a  similar 
reception  for  its  successor. 

It  may  seem  incongruous,  at  the  present 
moment  of  intense  stress  and  anxiety,  to 
publish  a  work  which  appeals  to  quiet  thought. 
It  was  written  before  the  war  broke  out ;  and 
I  can  scarcely  expect  much  attention  to  be 
paid  to  it  until  the  war  ends.  But  after  all. 
in  spite  of  all  our  struggles  and  anxiety,  the 
saying  of  St  Paul  remains  true,  "  The  things 
which  are  seen  are  temporal,  but  the  things 
which  are  not  seen  are  eternal." 

I  am  indebted  to  my  sister,  Miss  Alice 
Gardner,  for  the  Index,  and  to  her  and  Dr 
Moffatt  for  reading  the  proofs. 

PERCY   GARDNER. 

Oxford,  April  1915. 


CONTENTS 


PAGES 

Greek  Ephesus  ....-•  I-IS 

Greek  and  Asiatic  elements  at  Ephesus,  I  ;  the  goddess 
Artemis,  3  ;  strife  of  East  and  West,  6  ;  Heracleitus,  9  ; 
enlargement  of  the  city  by  Lysimachus,  11  ;  the  Romans, 
12  ;  mysticism  at  Ephesus,  13  ;  raising  of  men  to  divine 
rank,  17. 

II 

Ephesus  and  St  Paul      * 19-33 

Followers  of  John  the  Baptist  at  Ephesus,  19  ;  magicians 
and  exorcists,  22  ;  the  riot,  24  ;  "  fighting  with  beasts," 
26  ;  speech  to  Ephesian  Elders  at  Miletus,  27  ;  Epistle 
"to  the  Ephesians,"  31  ;  Ephesus  did  not  greatly  in- 
fluence St  Paul,  32. 

Ill 

Ephesus  after  St  Paui 34-51 

Ephesus  in  the  Apocalypse,  34  ;  the  Nicolaitans,  36  ;  post- 
Pauline  literature  at  Ephesus,  38  ;  confusion  of  Johns, 
39 ;  John  the  Prophet  and  John  the  Elder,  40 ;  the 
Apocalypse,  43  ;  Epistle  of  Ignatius,  47  ;  the  Third 
Council  of  the  Church,  49. 


viii  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

IV 

PAGES 

The  Ephesian  Gospel        .....         52-91 

The  literature  of  the  Gospel,  52 ;  the  writer  and  his 
sources,  53  ;  unessential  details  either  due  to  symbolism, 
57  ;  or  to  a  separate  tradition,  60;  examples,  61  ;  contro- 
versial purpose,  64  ;  comparison  with  other  theories  of 
authorship,  67  ;  corrections  of  Synoptists,  68  ;  the  Johan- 
nine  source,  69  ;  rivalry  with  St  Peter,  71  ;  date  of  death 
of  St  John,  72  ;  spiritual  transposition  of  tradition,  75  ; 
likeness  to  St  Paul,  78  ;  element  of  materialism,  80  ;  the 
biography  not  a  mere  composition,  83  ;  the  conscience  of 
the  Church  the  test  of  truth,  85  ;  genesis  of  the  Gospel, 
86  ;  seeing  the  invisible,  88  ;  non-natural  result,  90. 


The  Writer's  Idea  of  Biography    .         .         .       92-123 

Differences  between  ancient  and  modern  writing  of 
history,  92  ;  can  we  argue  from  Greek  and  Roman  to 
Tewish  writers?  94  ;  tendencies  of  Evangelists,  96  ; 
parallel  case  of  the  two  lives  of  Socrates  by  Xenophon 
and  Plato,  100  ;  comparison  of  Platonic  and  Johannine 
writing,  109;  the  last  days,  no;  artificial  construction 
of  discourses,  III  ;  examples,  112  ;  it  is  not  the  historic, 
but  the  exalted  Christ  who  speaks,  115  ;  this  sometimes 
slips  out  in  the  narrative  itself,  1 18. 

VI 

The  Basis  in  Christian  Experience  .         .     124-140 

Feeling  in  ancient  times  rather  civic  than  individual, 
124;  the  society  primary  in  early  Christianity,  126;  the 
Pauline  Churches,  127  ;  the  common  life,  128  ;  the  world 
a  hostile  medium,  129  ;  after  entry  into  the  Church,  first 
forgiveness,  130;  then  prayer,  132  ;  then  power  to  work 
marvels,  135;  then  the  bond  of  love,  136;  then  eternal 
life,  138- 


CONTENTS  ix 

VII 

PAGES 

Thk  Doctrine  of  the  Spirit   ....     141-162 

The  pneumatic  Gospel,  141  ;  origins  of  the  idea  of  spirit, 
142  ;  physical  transmission  of  spirit,  144 ;  the  Evangelist 
uses  the  word  spirit  in  three  senses,  146  ;  first,  in  a  cosmic 
sense,  146  ;  second,  as  the  inspiration  of  the  Church,  148  ; 
comparison  with  Paul  and  Luke,  150;  the  charismata, 
153  ;  identification  of  the  Spirit  with  the  exalted  Christ, 
157  ;  the  source  of  truth  and  light,  as  well  as  of  energy, 
158;  thirdly,  the  term  spirit  applied  to  good  and  evil 
demons,  160. 

VIII 

ESCHATOLOGV  :    ETERNAL    LlFE       ....        163-188 

The  three  questions  of  eschatology,  163  ;  first,  the  destiny 
and  meaning  of  the  world,  167  ;  second,  the  future  of  the 
individual  soul,  168  ;  how  far  the  Christian  doctrine 
Jewish,  169  ;  third,  the  relations  of  the  material  and 
spiritual  worlds,  170  ;  how  Jewish  apocalyptic  ideas  were 
merged,  171;  the  Evangelist  substitutes  present  for 
future,  172  ;  faith  confers  eternal  life,  175  ;  meaning  of 
the  latter  phrase,  177  ,'  in  the  Synoptics,  178;  in  St 
Paul,  180 ;  in  the  Evangelist,  183  ;  connection  with 
doctrine,   186. 

IX 

The  Sacraments        189-213 

Parallelism  to  pagan  mysteries,  189  ;  not  seriously  dis- 
puted, 193  ;  views  of  the  Evangelist,  195  ;  he  valued  the 
rites  of  Baptism  and  the  Lord's  Supper,  196  ;  but  de- 
tached them  from  history,  198  ;  treatment  of  John  the 
Baptist,  199  ;  the  conversation  with  Nicodemus,  201  ; 
account  of  the  Last  Supper,  202  ;  the  sixth  chapter,  204  ; 
spiritualisation  of  the  rite,  206  ;  the  miraculous  feeding  of 
the  multitude,  208  ;  the  contagion  of  the  spiritual  life, 
209  ;  the  Incarnation,  211. 


x  THE    EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

X 

PAGES 

Judaism  and  the  Gospel  .....     214-235 

Admission  of  Gentiles  to  the  Church  and  Universalism 
different  questions,  214  ;  the  racial  question  in  the 
Synoptics,  215  ;  in  St  Paul,  218  ;  in  the  Fourth  Gospel, 
219  ;  tendency  towards  universalism.  220  ;  immanent  in 
Christianity,  224  ;  the  question  of  the  Sabbath,  226  ;  the 
Jewish  Scriptures,  229  ;  the  racial  question,  232. 

XI 

The  Church   and  the  World  ....     236-255 

Pauline  and  Johannine  doctrine  of  the  Church,  236  ; 
differences  between  them,  239  ;  idea  of  the  Good  Shep- 
herd, 240 ;  of  the  Kingdom,  242  ;  the  Evangelist  is 
thinking  of  the  Christ  of  experience,  not  of  history,  243  ; 
the  corporate  life,  246  ;  opposition  to  the  world,  248  ; 
no  fixed  view  as  to  organisation,  252. 

XII 

Teaching  and  Ethics        .....     256-276 

The  ordinary  interpretation  of  "words  and  works''  in- 
adequate, 256  ;  three  kinds  of  truth  :  (1)  scientific,  257  ; 
(2)  metaphysical,  258  ;  (3)  ethical,  259  ;  truth  in  the 
Psalms,  260  ;  uses  in  the  Fourth  Gospel,  261  ;  applied  to 
prophecy  of  the  future,  263  ;  truth  not  mere  truths,  267  ; 
rudiments  of  a  creed,  269  :  truth  leads  to  liberty,  271  ;  it 
is  a  touchstone  to  discern  the  spiritual,  272  ;  it  implies 
devotion  to  the  Divine  will,  274  ;  and  leads  to  love,  274. 

XIII 

Miracle     277-2pO 

Miracle  in  the  East  the  sign  of  a  divine  mission,  277  ;  the 
Evangelist  looks  on  miracles  as  signs,  280  ;  their  higher 
meaning,  281  ;  the  raising  of  Lararus,  283  ;  the  Virgin 
Birth,  284  ;  the  Resurrection,  288. 


CONTENTS  xi 

XIV 

PAGES 

Christology       .  .  .  .  .  .  .291-318 

The  basis  of  the  Evangelist's  Christology  the  experience 
of  the  Church,  292  ;  his  special  tradition,  292  ;  the  claim 
of  Jesus  to  be  Son  of  God,  294  ;  the  Evangelist  dwells 
much  on  this  relation,  298  ;  and  on  his  Master's  super- 
natural powers,  300  ;  but  he  stops  short  of  Docetism, 
302  ;  beginnings  of  speculative  Christology,  308  ;  view 
of  the  Atonement,  310  ;  the  doctrine  of  the  logos,  312  : 
hence  superhuman  knowledge  of  Jesus,  316. 

XV 

The  Fourth  Gospel  and  Modernity  .     319-358 

Summary  in  relation  to  modern  thought,  319  ;  (1)  the 
spiritual  world  and  eternal  life,  321  ;  (2)  the  history  of 
the  Founder,  330  ;  (3)  the  Sacraments,  340 ;  (4)  the 
Church  visible  and  invisible,  342  ;  (5).  the  formulation  of 
doctrine,  345  ;  a  glance  at  modern  conditions,  355. 

Index         ........     359-362 


THE 

EPHESIAN  GOSPEL 

i 

GREEK    EPHESUS 

There  are  few  cities  which  have  a  more 
important  place  in  the  history  of  the  ancient 
world  than  Ephesus.  The  main  stream  of 
ancient  history  passes  through  Ephesus  again 
and  again.  And  I  venture  to  think  that  in 
the  early  history  of  Christianity,  save  only 
Jerusalem,  no  city  Iras  been  more  influential, 
not  even  Tarsus  or  Antioch  or  Rome. 

In  a  degree  which  it  is  hard  to  exaggerate, 
Ephesus  was  in  the  ages  which  preceded  Chris- 
tianity the  pivot  of  civilisation,  the  crucial 
meeting  place  of  East  and  West.  Among 
the  great  cities  founded  by  the  Ionians  on  the 
coast  of  Asia  Minor,  some  were  thoroughly 
Hellenic  in  type,  doors  by  which  the  Greek 
spirit  from  the  seventh  century  B.C.  was  con- 
stantly penetrating  into  Asia.  Such  were  not- 
ably Miletus  and   Phoetea.     Miletus   founded 

1 


2  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

a  great  trade  between  Greece  and  the  Black 
Sea,  whence  the  populous  cities  of  the  JEge&n 
derived  the  corn  and  fish  which  were  their 
chief  food,  and  the  wood,  hemp,  and  pitch 
which  they  needed  for  shipbuilding.  The  shore 
of  the  Euxine  was  studded  with  Greek  factories 
which  were  the  children  of  Miletus.  Phocaea 
worked  westwards :  on  the  shore  of  Italy,  at 
Velia,and  even  as  far  as  Marseilles,  the  Phocasan 
sailors  carried  their  trade,  and  their  piracy, 
which  was  closely  allied  to  trade.  With  the 
rise  of  the  wealthy  kings  of  Lydia,  there  was 
a  reversal  of  the  tide,  and  the  old  civilisation 
of  the  interior  of  Asia  Minor  began  to  over- 
power the  Greek  cities  of  the  coast.  When 
the  powerful  Persian  Empire  was  organised  by 
Cyrus,  Oriental  influence  grew  stronger.  The 
Persians  were  masters  of  all  Asia  down  to  the 
coast ;  and  the  Ionian  aggression  was  swept 
back.  By  the  beginning  of  the  fifth  century, 
Phocaea  and  Miletus  were  destroyed  by  the 
Persians,  and  did  not  for  centuries  recover 
much  power.  But  Ephesus  the  Persians  never 
destroyed  :  rather  they  cherished  it  as  an  out- 
post against  the  power  of  Hellas. 

But  Ephesus  was  not  a  merely  Asiatic  city. 
It  consisted  of  two  parts.  Built  on  the  hills 
which  surrounded  the  harbour  was  a  Greek 
city  of  trade,  the  city  founded  by  the  Athenian 


GREEK   EPHESUS  3 

Androclus,  and  enlarged  and  fortified  at  a 
later  time  by  one  of  the  generals  of  Alexander, 
Lysimachus  the  Macedonian.  At  some  dis- 
tance inland  was  the  other  part  of  the  city, 
which  had  grown  up  round  the  vast  and 
magnificent  temple  of  the  goddess  Artemis, 
and  which  was  not  really  Greek,  but  largely 
inhabited  by  the  peoples  of  Asia  Minor — 
Phrygians  and  Leleges. 

Such  a  division  was  not  rare  in  the  case  of 
Greek  settlements.  When  the  colonists  arrived, 
they  found  a  great  religious  community  already 
established.  The  Artemis  of  Ephesus  was  not 
only  the  swift  huntress,  the  sister  of  Apollo, 
with  whom  Greek  sculpture  has  made  us 
familiar ;  she  was  also  the  local  rendering  of 
the  great  goddess  of  nature,  who  had  many 
shrines  in  Asia  Minor  and  the  East,  the  deity 
of  the  productive  powers  of  nature,  source  of 
the  overflowing  life  which  wells  up  with  the 
spring  in  trees  and  corn,  in  animals  and  in  man 
himself.  From  a  remote  antiquity  such  a 
mother-goddess  had  been  the  chief  object  of 
worship  among  the  Syrians  and  Phrygians  and 
other  primitive  peoples.  The  wild  places  of 
the  land  and  wild  animals  were  especially 
sacred  to  her. 

The  likeness  between  the  Phrygian  goddess 
and  the  Greek  Artemis  lay  almost  exclusively 


4  THE   EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

in  this  attachment  to  nature  and  the  animals 
of  nature.  Probably,  however,  the  fact  that 
both  deities  were  connected  with  the  moon, 
and  with  childbirth,  which  the  religion  of 
many  nations  has  placed  under  the  control 
of  the  moon-goddess,  formed  a  further  link. 
But  the  Asiatic  mother  -  goddess  was  wor- 
shipped in  various  ways  in  her  different  homes. 
At  Babylon  and  elsewhere  her  temple  was  a 
seat  of  prostitution.  At  Ephesus  she  appears 
in  historic  times,  owing  doubtless  to  Greek 
influence,  in  far  less  repulsive  guise.  She  was 
served  by  a  troop  of  virgin  priestesses,  called 
melissas  or  bees,  under  the  superintendence  of 
a  chief  who  was  an  eunuch,  and  who  bore  the 
Persian-sounding  title  of  Megabyzus.  These 
priestesses  were  supposed  to  represent  the 
Amazons,  who  were  regarded  as  having  been 
the  original  votaries  of  the  deity.  They 
danced  sacred  dances  in  her  honour  at  the 
great  festivals.  Other  servants  of  the  goddess 
were  Theologi,  who  may  have  recited  sacred 
legends,  hymn-makers,  and  a  crowd  of  slaves 
or  hierodules.  Crowds  of  images  were  carried 
in  the  sacred  pomps.  Unfortunately,  we  know 
but  little  of  the  details  of  the  cultus. 

Ephesus  was  not  the  seat  of  an  oracle : 
the  function  of  serving  as  the  mouthpiece  of 
the  higher  powers  was  left  by  Artemis  to  her 


GREEK   EPHESUS  5 

brother  Apollo.  But  another  function  of  the 
temple  was  of  great  importance.  It  was  a 
sanctuary:  those  who  had  unintentionally 
committed  homicide,  and  even  criminals,  were 
safe  from  pursuit  within  a  sacred  boundary 
marked  Out  round  the  shrine.  Before  justice 
in  a  state  is  organised,  while  the  punishment 
for  offences  is  left  to  private  vengeance,  such 
sanctuaries  serve  a  necessary  purpose.  We 
read  of  cities  of  refuge  among  the  Israelites  : 
and  in  mediaeval  Europe  many  sacred  places 
served  the  same  purpose.  Mark  Antony,  with 
his  usual  impulsiveness,  to  please  the  people, 
enlarged  the  limits  of  the  sanctuary,  so  that 
it  took  in  part  of  the  town,'  which,  of  course, 
thereupon  became  a  haunt  of  robbers  and 
assassins,  and  the  dangerous  privilege  had  to 
be  reduced. 

The  image  of  the  goddess,  which  was  of 
unknown  antiquity,  and  which,  if  for  a  time 
set  aside,  had  been  restored  to  honour  by  the 
time  of  St  Paul,  was  a  mere  cone,  with  human 
head  and  hands,  and  many  breasts  on  the 
bosom  to  signify  the  abundant  life  of  nature. 
Between  this  bounteous  form  and  the  notion 
of  virginity  there  seems  to  be  little  in  common. 
But  the  nature-goddess  of  Western  Asia  com- 
bined many  attributes  ;  and  in  her  service  the 
two  extremes  of   sexual    relation    met.      So 


6  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

although  at  Ephesus  the  priestesses  of  Artemis 
were  virgins,  yet  there  were  doubtless  elements 
of  sexual  impurity  in  her  festivals. 

How  was  it  that  the  Ionians,  coming  at  a 
time  when  the  orderly  Olympus  of  Homer, 
with  a  beautiful  band  of  deities  presided  over 
by  a  supreme  Father,  was  fully  recognised 
by  the  race,  were  content  to  regard  with 
veneration  this  hideous  image,  and  to  accept 
religious  customs  and  institutions  full  of 
primitive  barbarism,  and  neither  pleasing  nor 
chaste  ?  The  answer  goes  deep.  Greek  re- 
ligion, in  spite  of  the  aesthetic  charm  of  its 
ritual,  and  the  beautiful  architecture  and 
sculpture  and  poetry  in  which  it  found  em- 
bodiment, had  no  proselytising  power.  It 
did  not  satisfy  the  deep  needs  of  the  human 
heart,  the  sense  of  an  indwelling  spiritual 
power,  the  sense  of  sin  and  the  desire  of 
purity,  the  longing  for  a  life  to  reach  beyond 
the  bounds  of  the  present.  These  needs  had 
little  to  do  with  the  worship  of  the  Greek 
Artemis,  who,  except  in  the  important  matter 
of  childbirth,  had  no  place  in  the  central 
tendencies  of  human  life.  But  they  were 
met  in  a  measure,  however  crudely  and  bar- 
barously, by  the  cult  of  the  great  Anatolian 
nature-goddess,  who  lived  not  only  in  the 
temple,  but  in  the  primeval  impulses  of  her 


GREEK   EPHESUS  7 

votaries,  and  aroused  in  them  an  enthusiasm 
which  did  not  suit  Hellenic  religion,  and, 
indeed,  which  the  more  refined  and  intellectual 
Greeks  were  inclined  to  despise. 

Through  all  the  history  of  Ephesus  we  see 
the  influences  which  radiated  from  the  market- 
place and  the  harbour,  and  those  which  radi- 
ated from  the  temple  of  Artemis  clashing  one 
with  the  other.  The  eternal  strife  of  East  and 
West  was  in  no  place  more  strikingly  exhibited. 
As  a  mart  and  seaport  Ephesus  held  a  very 
important  position.  The  city  was,  especially 
after  the  fall  of  Miletus  and  Phoceea,  the 
natural  focus  of  the  trade  between  Greece  and 
Italy  on  the  one  side,  and  the  inland  country 
of  Phrygia  on  the  other.  Phrygia  is  a  rich 
country  ;  and  through  it,  by  the  great  Persian 
road,  came  the  luxurious  wares  of  the  further 
East.  Oriental  wealth  and  luxury  poured 
into  Ephesus,  and  with  them  the  ideas  of 
Oriental  religion,  the  chief  focus  of  which  in 
the  second  millennium  before  our  era  was  the 
great  city  of  Babylon. 

In  prehistoric  times  Babylon  had  been  to 
Western  Asia  and  the  Levant  a  sort  of 
religious  metropolis,  something  of  what  Rome 
was  to  mediaeval  Europe.  Then  her  influence 
had  spread  to  the  coast,  and  to  Cyprus  and 
Crete  in  the  Mediterranean.     The  Ionians  had 


8  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

brought  into  Asia  a  wave  of  fresh  air,  but 
their  influence  at  first  did  not  deeply  pene- 
trate. When  Crcesus,  the  powerful  King  of 
Lydia,  came  to  besiege  their  city,  the  people 
of  Ephesus  stretched  a  rope  from  the  com- 
mercial city  to  the  temple  of  Artemis,  thus  in 
a  literal  sense  binding  the  city  to  its  goddess, 
a  goddess  whom  they  expected  the  king  to 
venerate.  And  the  device  succeeded.  Crcesus 
recognised  that  the  Ephesian  Artemis  was  but 
a  variety  of  the  protecting  goddess  of  Sardes, 
his  capital.  He  became  her  enthusiastic  votary, 
and  helped  the  Ephesians  to  build  a  splendid 
temple  in  her  honour,  on  a  magnificent  scale. 
Herodotus  tells  us  that  he  gave  to  her  some 
golden  cows  and  many  columns.  And  when 
the  English  architect,  Wood,  excavated  the 
site  of  the  great  temple,  he  found  and  brought 
to  the  British  Museum  many  fragments  of 
columns,  adorned  with  reliefs  and  still  bearing 
fragments  of  the  inscription  "  Dedicated  by 
King  Crcesus."  Crcesus  soon  fell  before  Cyrus 
and  his  hardy  Persian  soldiery  ;  and  doubtless 
the  Persians,  in  pursuance  of  their  usual  policy, 
cherished  the  worship  of  the  local  deity. 

Towards  the  end  of  the  sixth  century  B.C., 
the  overflowing  vitality  of  the  Greek  race 
acted  in  all  directions.  At  Ephesus  it  resulted 
in  the  establishment  of  a  remarkable  school 


GREEK   EPHESUS  9 

of  philosophy,  one  of  the  most  important  in 
the  days  before  Socrates.  Its  chief  figure  was 
Heracleitus,  whose  writings,  save  for  some 
fragments,  have  been  lost  to  us,  but  of  whom 
the  ancient  historians  of  philosophy  speak  in 
terms  of  high  appreciation.  He  was  said  to 
have  belonged  to  the  royal  house,  but  to  have 
given  up  all  worldly  ambition  and  retired  into 
the  wilderness  like  John  the  Baptist,  to  live  on 
herbs,  and  to  meditate  on  nature  and  man. 
So  far  as  we  can  recover  his  teachings,  they 
seem  to  maintain  that  the  secret  of  life  and 
energy  in  the  world  is  a  kind  of  fire,  not  the 
mere  visible  fire  of  the  furnace,  but  an  energis- 
ing fluid,  which  is  the  cause  of  life  in  nature 
and  in  man,  and  which  is  manifested  in  the 
world  in  the  process  of  becoming,  that  is, 
passing  from  the  invisible  into  the  visible  or 
actual.  The  crude  views  of  the  early  natural- 
ists of  Ionia,  such  as  Thales,  who  had  held 
moisture  to  be  the  ultimate  essence  of  things, 
were  soon  surpassed  and  died  away.  But 
Heracleitus  founded  at  Ephesus  a  school  which 
long  survived.  It  was  said  of  Plato  that  before 
he  came  into  contact  with  Socrates  he  had 
been  a  follower  of  Heracleitus.  Socrates 
himself  professed  a  great  admiration  for  the 
writings  of  the  Ephesian  philosopher,  though 
he   regarded    them    as    hard   to    understand. 


10  THE   EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

And  even  as  late  as  the  Christian  era,  admirers 
of  Heracleitus  wrote  letters  in  his  name,  which 
have  come  down  to  our  days.  Heracleitus 
seems  to  have  been  the  first  to  speak  of  reason 
as  dominant  in  the  Universe,  thus  opening  a 
way  along  which  many  future  thinkers  were  to 
travel.  I  cannot  in  this  place  say  more  as 
to  the  philosophy  of  Heracleitus,  but  I  shall 
return  to  the  subject  when  the  Johannine 
logos  comes  up  for  discussion. 

Ephesus  took  no  active  part  in  the  Ionian 
revolt  against  Persia  in  B.C.  500 ;  she  left  the 
leadership  in  it  to  Miletus  and  Chios,  an  indi- 
cation of  her  closer  relations  with  the  East. 
But  when,  after  the  failure  of  the  Persian 
invasion  of  Greece  Proper  by  Xerxes,  the 
fleets  of  Athens  were  dominant  in  the  iEgean 
Sea,  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  hearts 
of  the  Ephesians  turned  more  to  their  great 
mother-city,  and  Persian  preponderance  waned. 
It  was,  however,  in  the  days  of  the  great 
Alexander  that  the  West  completely  turned 
the  tables  on  the  East.  Then  the  Greeks  of 
Hellas  and  Ionia  became  the  dominant  caste 
as  far  as  India,  and  the  deities  of  Greece 
invaded  the  cities  founded  by  the  Macedonian 
conqueror  and  his  successors  in  Asia  Minor 
and  Syria.  But  this  movement  did  not 
decrease  the  vogue  of  the  Ephesian  goddess ; 


GREEK   EPHESUS  11 

it  only  laid  fresh  emphasis  on  what  was 
Hellenic  in  her  cultus.  The  great  temple 
built  by  Croesus  was  burned  down  on  the 
day,  it  was  said,  on  which  Alexander  the 
Great  was  born.  A  new  and  still  more 
splendid-  edifice  rose  in  its  place,  the  cities 
and  rulers  of  Asia  and  Greece  making  magni- 
ficent contributions.  Some  of  the  colossal 
columns  of  this  later  edifice  also  are  in  the 
British  Museum.  Like  the  earlier  columns, 
they  are  sculptured  in  relief,  but  in  the  style 
of  the  Athenian  art  of  the  fourth  century. 

The  coins  of  Ephesus,  about  b.c.  287,  bear 
eloquent  testimony  to  the  intensification  of 
Greek  elements  in  the  religion  of  the  city. 
At  that  time  Lysimachus,  one  of  Alexander's 
officers,  had  acquired  the  city ;  he  threw  a  line 
of  walls  round  the  "commercial  quarter,  and 
renamed  the  place  after  his  wife,  Arsinoe. 
Up  to  this  time  the  coinage  of  Ephesus  had 
been  stamped  with  types  of  symbolic  import, 
the  bee  and  the  stag,  both  creatures  connected 
with  the  worship  of  the  local  goddess.  But 
under  Lysimachus  we  find  on  the  money 
beautiful  heads  of  the  Greek  Artemis.  Prob- 
ably at  the  same  time  the  primitive  Asiatic 
images  which  had  represented  the  goddess 
were  superseded  in  the  place  of  honour  by  a 
statue  by  some  great  Greek  sculptor. 


/ 


12  THE    EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

When  the  Romans  succeeded  to  the  heri- 
tage of  Alexander,  and  became  masters  of 
Asia  Minor,  they  brought  great  prosperity  to 
Ephesus,  which,  under  them,  was  the  chief 
port  of  Ionia.  Their  rule  extended  far  inland 
the  material  features  of  civilisation,  great  cities, 
well  built  and  supplied  with  water  and  drain- 
age, roads  connecting  district  with  district, 
and  making  closer  communication  possible. 
The  architect,  the  engineer,  and  the  tax- 
gatherer  spread  into  Asia,  and  municipal 
organisation  was  much  advanced.  But  as 
regards  the  higher  aspects  of  civilisation,  the 
Romans  were  less  successful.  The  native 
languages  gave  way  but  slowly  to  Greek  and 
Latin.  It  was  not  for  the  Romans  to  teach 
the  peoples  letters  and  science  and  art ;  they 
could  only  make  an  opening  through  which 
the  brilliant  achievements  of  the  Greeks  in 
these  fields  might  be  made  familiar  to  the 
semi-barbarians  of  the  interior.  Greece  still  pro- 
duced ;  Athens  and  Alexandria  and  Ephesus 
still  sent  out  men  of  science,  orators,  and 
philosophers  who  worked  eastwards  ;  so  that 
there  arose,  at  least  on  the  surface,  a  homo- 
geneous civilisation  as  far  as  the  confines  of  the 
Parthian  Empire,  and  in  the  great  cities,  even 
further,  to  India  and  the  borders  of  China. 

But  what  of  religion  ?     We  have  seen  how, 


GREEK   EPHESUS  13 

in  the  first  flush  of  the  victories  of  Alexander, 
there  was  a  tendency  for  Greek  religion  to 
gain  ground  in  Asia,  and  for  the  deities  of  the 
native  races  to  take  upon  them  Hellenic  forms. 
But  that  movement  was  neither  strong  nor 
lasting.  The  beautiful  religion  of  Greece, 
closely  allied  to  art  and  culture,  was  not 
adapted  to  the  rough  lives  and  the  untamed 
emotions  of  the  Lydians  and  Syrians.  The 
coinage  of  Ephesus  soon  marks  a  retrogression. 
The  beautiful  head  of  Artemis  vanishes  from 
it,  and  the  old  types  of  bee  and  stag  come 
back,  to  be  in  turn,  before  long,  ousted  by 
the  barbarous,  many-breasted  image  of  the 
great  nature-goddess  of  Asia.  This  was  the 
image  which  the  people  really  venerated. 
There  was  a  story  that  it  had  fallen  from 
heaven.  The  core  of  it  was  a  rude  cone,  but  it 
was  overlaid,  like  a  modern  sacred  image,  with 
gold  and  jewels. 

It  is  well  known  that  in  the  centuries  just 
before  the  Christian  era  there  was  on  all  the 
eastern  shores  of  the  Mediterranean  a  recru- 
descence of  primitive  religion.  It  is  a  pheno- 
menon familiar  to  all  students  of  religious 
history.  When  the  established  and  received 
religion  of  a  country  grows  weak  and  sapless, 
there  spring  from  the  lower  strata  of  the  people 
fresh  snoots  of  faith  and  belief,  often  unlovely 


14  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

in  their  manifestation,  and  poor  on  the  in- 
tellectual side,  but  bearing  witness  to  the 
eternal  hunger  of  the  human  heart  for  some 
medicine  which  will  remove  the  sense  of 
estrangement  between  man  and  the  higher 
powers,  and  bring  the  life  of  the  people  into 
some  sort  of  harmony  with  the  spirit  which  is 
revealed  in  the  scenes  of  nature  and  the  events 
of  human  life. 

Of  such  a  religious  revival  Ephesus  was  one 
of  the  foci.  The  Mystery  Religions  found 
their  richest  soil  in  Phrygia,  and  most  of  them, 
the  worships  of  Sabazius,  of  Cybele,  of  Mithras, 
were  full  of  Phrygian  elements.  The  received 
religion  of  Ephesus  was  of  the  Phrygian  class, 
with  priests  who  were  eunuchs,  crowds  of 
virgins  dedicated  to  the  goddess,  who  per- 
formed orgiastic  dances  in  her  honour,  with 
nightly  ceremonies  and  sacred  lore  hidden 
from  all  but  the  officials.  In  the  early  Roman 
age  there  was  no  cultus  more  popular  than 
that  of  the  Ephesian  Artemis.  Pausanias  tells 
us x  that  many  people  of  his  time  regarded  her 
as  the  greatest  of  all  the  deities,  and  that 
almost  all  cities  had  temples  for  her  worship  ; 
and  the  latter  statement  is  borne  out  by  numis- 
matic evidence,  as  there  are  many  cities  in 
Asia  in  which  her  effigy  appears  on  the  coins. 

1  iv.  31,  8. 


GREEK   EPHESUS  15 

The  mystery  religions  had  a  better  aspect 
in  that  they  taught  of  deliverance  from  im- 
purity and  of  a  life  beyond  the  tomb,  and  a 
worse  aspect  in  that  they  opened  the  way  to 
superstition,  to  materialism,  and  to  magic. 
This  worse  side  was  certainly  prominent  at 
Ephesus,  since  ancient  writers  tell  us  of  magi- 
cal formulae,  the  Ephcsian  sentences,  which  were 
closely  related  to  the  temple  worship,  but  were 
the  stock-in-trade  of  those  impostors  who  tried 
by  means  of  them  to  foretell  the  fortunes  of 
their  customers,  or  to  furnish  them  with  spells 
of  great  avail  for  the  injury  of  rivals  or  the 
escape  from  dangers. 

Mysticism  may  be  called,  the  protoplasm 
whence  all  the  higher  developments  in  religion 
spring.  And  it  is  also  the  source  of  many  of 
those  baser  elements  .in  religion  which  adapt 
it  to  popular  use,  just  as  the  alloy  in  our  gold 
and  silver  coins  fits  them  for  handling  in  the 
market.  In  every  city,  as  in  every  nation, 
there  are  strata  in  religion :  the  stratum  of  the 
inspired  prophet,  of  the  poet,  of  the  moralist, 
of  the  man  of  the  world,  of  those  whose 
whole  energies  are  absorbed  in  the  battle 
for  daily  bread.  And  yet,  in  spite  of  the 
arrangement  in  strata  and  the  divergency  of 
schools,  each  race  and  district  has  a  tone  in 
religion.      The  tone  in  Edinburgh   to-day  is 


16  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

very  different  from  that  in  Oxford,  and  that 
in  Oxford  from  that  in  Rome.  Centuries  of 
continued  influence  by  the  religion  of  Phrygia, 
and  the  proud  position  of  representing  the 
great  goddess  of  nature  in  the  Hellenic  world, 
had  prepared  the  people  of  Ephesus  to  give  a 
certain  tinge  to  every  school  of  religion  which 
arose  among  them.  Men  of  great  genius  are 
less  open  than  others  to  local  influence,  be- 
cause they  rise  above  the  local  level  into  the 
air  of  a  higher  and  more  refined  humanity. 
The  author  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  wrote  for  all 
Europe  and  Asia,  and  for  all  time.  And  yet 
one  may  venture  to  say  that,  humanly  speak- 
ing, his  writings  could  only  have  arisen  after 
there  had  been  a  fusion  of  the  teaching  of 
Palestine  with  the  tendencies  of  the  mystic 
cults  of  Asia. 

Sir  William  Ramsay  has  shown  how  Tarsus 
was  the  natural  and  destined  birthplace  of 
St  Paul.  In  the  same  way  Ephesus  was 
preordained  to  be  the  place  which  should  give 
birth  alike  to  the  writings  of  John  the  Prophet, 
as  he  calls  himself,  the  author  of  the  Apocalypse, 
and  of  the  great  theologian  who  composed 
the  Fourth  Gospel.  That  John  the  son 
of  Zebedee  settled  at  Ephesus,  and  was  a 
venerated  figure  in  the  Church  there,  we  have 
some  evidence.     His  teachings  fell  on  a  soil 


GREEK  EPHESUS  17 

rich  alike  with  the  learning  of  Jewish 
Hellenists,  the  wisdom  of  Greek  philosophy, 
and  the  enthusiasm  of  Phrygian  mystics, 
and  they  bore  much  fruit  for  the  Church 
of  all  future  time. 

At  various  periods  of  her  history  Ephesus 
had  shown  a  tendency  to  raise  human  beings 
to  divine  rank.  Plutarch  says  that  Lysander, 
after  his  victory  over  Athens,  was  the  first 
of  the  Greeks  to  receive  divine  honours. 
These  honours  came  from  the  Ionians.  As 
Grote  says  : 1  "  Altars  were  erected  to  him  ; 
paeans  or  hymns  were  composed  in  his  honour; 
the  Ephesians  set  up  his  statue  in  the  temple 
of  their  goddess  Artemis ;  while  the  Samians 
not  only  erected  a  statue  to  him  at  Olympia, 
but  even  altered  the  name  of  their  great 
festival — the  Heraea*— to  Lysandria."  When 
Alexander  the  Great  was  in  Asia,  he  offered 
to  rebuild  the  temple  of  Artemis,  then  in 
ruins,  if  the  Ephesians  would  allow  him  to 
inscribe  on  it  his  name  as  dedicator.  The 
Ephesians  refused  ;  and  the  reason  which  they 
gave  for  refusal,  if  politic,  was  also  character- 
istic of  them :  "  It  is  not  right  for  one 
deity  to  dedicate  a  temple  to  another." 

The  Seleucid  kings  of  Syria  and  the 
Ptolemies  of  Egypt   succeeded   one   another 

1  Part  II.  ch.  lxv. 

2 


18  THE   EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

in  facile  deification  by  the  degenerate  Ionians. 
In  B.C.  47  Julius  Caesar  was  deified  by  the 
Ephesians  with  the  titles  of  Saviour  and 
Benefactor.1  We  see,  then,  that  the  people 
of  Ephesus  were,  beyond  all  peoples,  ready  to 
bestow  divine  honours  on  generals  and  kings. 

1  W.  W.  Fowler,  Roman  Ideas  of  Deity,  p.   144. 


II 

EPHESUS    AND   ST   PAUL 

The  importance  of  Ephesus  for  Christianity 
begins  with  the  visit  of  St  Paul,  about  a.d. 
50-55.  Every  event  in  the  three  years'  stay 
of  the  Apostle  which  is  recorded  in  Acts  is 
characteristic.  He  found  himself  in  the  midst 
of  a  society  in  which  religion,  good  and  bad, 
was  the  chief  interest.  His  dealings,  as  always, 
began  with  the  Jews,'  who  here,  as  in  all  the 
great  trading  cities,  were  numerous.  But 
their  tendency  was  very  different  from  that 
of  the  conservative  Jews  of  Palestine.  They 
seem  to  have  been  eagerly  looking  out  for 
fresh  developments. 

Some  of  these  Jews  were  disciples  of  John 
the  Baptist,  who  seem,  according  to  Luke,  to 
have  known  little  of  the  faith  of  Jesus,  and  less 
of  the  history  of  the  Church  after  the  Cruci- 
fixion. It  may  well  seem  extraordinary  that 
news  of  these  doings  should  not  have  come  to 

19 


20  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

Ephesus  from  Palestine  ;  but  we  moderns  are 
apt  to  be  led  astray  by  the  ease  and  rapidity 
with  which  tidings  are  diffused  in  our  days 
by  newspapers.  In  a  later  chapter  of  Acts, 
Luke  tells  us  that  when  St.  Paul  reached 
Rome,  he  found  that  the  Jews  there  had 
never  heard  of  him  :  "  We  neither  received 
letters  from  Judaea  concerning  thee,  nor  did 
any  of  the  brethren  come  hither,  and  report 
or  speak  any  harm  of  thee."1  The  testimony 
of  Luke  as  to  Ephesus  is  not  given  casually, 
but  he  insists  on  it  with  iteration.  When 
Priscilla  and  Aquila  were  at  Ephesus,  before 
Paul's  stay  in  the  city,  there  arrived  Apollos, 
a  preacher  with  a  profound  knowledge  of  the 
Jewish  Scriptures,  and  instructed  in  the  Chris- 
tian way ;  yet  he  had  not  heard  of  Christian 
baptism,  but  only  of  that  of  John.  And  at  a 
later  time,  when  Paul  came  himself,  he  found  a 
small  society  of  twelve  men  who  had  received 
the  baptism  of  John,  and  been  attracted  to 
the  Christian  society,  but  did  not  know  of 
the  energising  power  of  the  Holy  Spirit, 
which  at  the  time  was  working  so  mightily 
in  the  Church,  inflaming  the  disciples  with 
zeal,  and  manifested  outwardly  in  the  gift  of 
tongues  and  spiritual  rapture.  These  gifts 
came  to  the  men  when  they  had  been  baptised 

1  Acts  xxviii.  21. 


EPHESUS   AND   ST   PAUL  21 

into  the  name  of  Jesus,  and  when  Paul,  as 
we  are  told,  had  laid  his  hands  on  them. 
This  last  statement  seems  somewhat  open  to 
doubt,  since  in  St  Paul's  own  letters1  we 
find  much  about  baptism,  but  nothing  as  to 
the  rite  .of  the  laying  on  of  hands.  Since, 
however,  Jesus  Himself  frequently  laid  His 
hands  on  those  whom  He  would  heal,  and 
the  rite  of  the  laying  on  of  hands  to  impart 
the  gifts  of  the  Spirit  wras  practised  by  the 
Apostles,  it  is  very  natural  that  Luke  should 
speak  of  St  Paul  as  conforming  to  the 
custom. 

The  existence  at  Ephesus,  far  distant  from 
Palestine,  of  a  set  of  men  who  had  received 
the  baptism  of  John,  but  knew  only  a  stunted 
Christianity,  is  remarkable.  It  does  not  seem 
that  the  Jews  who  were  in  this  case  had  them- 
selves been  baptised  by  John  in  Jordan,  but 
only  that  they  accepted  John's  call  to  repent- 
ance, and  were  baptised  into  the  society 
founded  by  him,  a  society  which  was  only 
gradually  merged  in  the  Christian  Church. 
The  facts  recorded  in  Acts  show  us,  as  in 
a  mirror,  what   an  extraordinary  change  was 

1  Excepting,  that  is,  the  doubtful  letters  to  Titus  and 
Timothy.  In  Acts  xxviii.  8,  Paul  is  said  to  have  healed  the 
father  of  Publius  by  the  laying  on  of  hands.  It  is,  of 
course,  one  thing  to  heal  by  touching,  and  another  thing 
to  impart  by  that  means  the  Christian  charismata. 


22  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

wrought  among  Jewish  disciples  outside 
Palestine  by  the  preaching  of  Paul  and  his 
school.  It  does  not  seem  that  these  Ephesian 
Jews  were  in  any  strict  sense  disciples  of  John, 
rather  they  were  disciples  of  some  Christians 
who  had  not  followed  the  great  change  and 
development  which  had  taken  place  in  the 
Church  in  the  years  a.d.  30-50.  They  must 
have  accepted  Jesus  as  the  Messiah,  and  prob- 
ably expected  His  return  in  the  clouds  of 
heaven  ;  but  they  did  not  realise  their  duties 
and  privileges  as  part  of  the  body  of  Christ  on 
earth. 

Others  of  the  Jews  at  Ephesus  were  magi- 
cians and  exorcists.  Like  many  Jews  in  all 
ages,  they  had  caught  the  spirit  of  their  sur- 
roundings, and  carried  it  further.  Ephesus 
was  eminently  a  city  of  magic  and  mysterious 
spells.  The  magicians  found  in  the  Pauline 
preaching  only  material  for  a  further  exer- 
cise of  their  arts.  The  name  of  "  Jesus  whom 
Paul  preached  "  was  found  to  have  a  greater 
power  in  spells  and  exorcisms  than  any  of  the 
names  to  which  they  were  accustomed.  But 
when  they  imagined  that  they  had  discovered 
a  new  way  of  bending  evil  spirits  to  their  will, 
they  were  soon  undeceived.  The  touch  of 
St  Paul,  and  even  handkerchiefs  which  had 
been  in  contact  with  him,  had  a  strange  power 


EPHESUS    AND   ST   PAUL  23 

of  healing  disease  and  casting  out  evil  spirits. 
But  when  the  sons  of  the  Jew  Sceva  attempted 
to  use  the  name  of  Jesus  in  their  incantations, 
the  man  in  whom  was  the  evil  spirit  which 
they  were  trying  to  expel  "leaped  on  them 
and  mastered  them,  and  prevailed  against 
them,  so  that  they  fled  out  of  that  house 
naked  and  wounded."  They  had  been  indeed 
playing  with  fire.  The  fame  of  their  defeat 
spread ;  and  by  a  natural  reaction  the  dealers 
in  spells  and  charms  were  ready  to  confess 
their  impostures,  and  even  to  burn  their  books 
of  magic.  These  were  destroyed  in  the  fire, 
and  the  value  of  them  was  said  to  have 
amounted  to  50,000  pieces  of  silver.  It  is 
natural  that  when  books  of  magic  are  really 
believed  in  their  worth  is  almost  beyond  price. 
And  nowhere  was  the  literature  of  magic 
more  plentiful  and  more  in  fashion  than  in 
Ephesus. 

The  awakening  soon  spread  beyond  the 
Jewish  pale.  We  learn  that  some  of  the 
Asiarchs  were  at  least  interested  in  St  Paul. 
The  Asiarchs  were  perhaps  men  of  wealth, 
selected  by  the  Roman  Proconsul  to  organise 
at  their  own  expense  the  festival  and  games  in 
honour  of  Rome  and  the  Emperor.  They 
would  scarcely  be  Christians ;  but  they  were 
at  least  so  far  favourable  to  St  Paul  that  they 


24  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

advised  him  to  keep  away  from  the  theatre 
at  the  time  of  the  riot  stirred  up  by  Demetrius 
the  silversmith.  Everyone  knows  the  story 
as  related  in  Acts.  Demetrius  represented  to 
others  of  his  craft  that  the  trade  by  which 
they  lived,  the  making  of  silver  shrines  of  the 
goddess  Artemis,  was  in  danger  of  being 
spoiled  by  the  preachers  of  the  new  religion. 
With  this  more  sordid  motive  was  mingled 
a  pride  in  the  worship  which  was  the  pride  of 
Ephesus.  The  result  was  that  a  great  crowd 
invaded  the  theatre,  dragging  with  them  Gaius 
and  Aristarchus,  Paul's  companions  in  travel. 
The  Jews  put  forward  a  certain  Alexander, 
apparently  offering  him  to  the  fury  of  the 
crowd ;  but  the  excited  people  refused  to 
listen  to  his  defence,  but  only  cried  the  more 
lustily,  "  Great  is  Artemis  of  the  Ephesians." 
The  riot  was  subdued  by  the  town-clerk  or 
treasurer,  a  wise  official,  who  took  the  line 
that  the  cultus  of  the  goddess  was  too  well 
founded  and  universally  respected  to  be  hurt 
by  the  opposition  of  a  handful  of  fanatics. 

Luke,  though  full  of  Christian  spirit  and 
an  admirable  writer,  is  somewhat  prone,  as 
we  know  from  his  Gospel,  compared  with 
the  others,  to  be  dazzled  by  what  is  marvel- 
lous, picturesque,  and  striking.  This  vivid 
episode   has   evidently   eclipsed   for  him   the 


EPHESUS   AND   ST   PAUL  25 

other  events  of  St  Paul's  stay  in  Ephesus. 
It  is,  however,  remarkable  that  St  Paul,  ad- 
dressing at  a  later  time  the  Presbyters  of 
Ephesus,  and  reminding  them  of  the  events 
of  his  sojourn  among  them,  does  not  mention 
his  peril  •  in  the  theatre,  but  does  speak  of 
dangers  incurred  from  plots  of  the  Jews. 
We  may  strongly  suspect  that  in  Ephesus,  as 
in  Corinth  and  other  cities,  the  most  danger- 
ous opponents  of  Christianity  were  really 
the  Jews,  and  that  the  doctrine  of  St  Paul 
found  a  readier  welcome  among  the  Greeks 
than  with  them.  Of  course  the  pagan  mob 
of  the  city  was  devoted  to  the  worship  of 
Artemis;  but  there  were,  doubtless,  many 
Greeks  of  higher  religious  type,  who  would 
welcome  the  Pauline  teaching,  and  might 
even  find  that  their*  pagan  beliefs  served  as 
guides  to  bring  them  to  Christianity.  The 
great  Pauline  teachings  of  the  exalted  Christ 
and  salvation  by  faith  in  Him  were  in  essence 
far  nearer  to  the  beliefs  inculcated  in  the 
nobler  forms  of  the  Pagan  Mysteries  than 
they  were  to  conservative  Jewish  orthodoxy. 
We  might  expect  Christianity  at  Ephesus 
to  move  in  the  direction  of  Christian  mysti- 
cism. And  we  shall  find,  as  a  matter  of 
history,  that  it  did  grow  in  that  direction. 
There  is  a  curious  phrase  in  the  First  Epistle 


26  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

to  the  Corinthians  (xv.  32),  in  which  the 
Apostle  speaks  of  fighting  with  wild  beasts 
at  Ephesus.  The  connection  is  this:  the 
Apostle  is  declaring  that,  apart  from  hope 
in  Christ,  he  would  never  have  undergone 
all  the  troubles  and  perils  which  he  had  en- 
countered.  "I  protest,"  he  says,  "that  I 
die  every  day " ;  and  he  goes  on  to  mention 
this  fighting  with  wild  beasts  as  an  instance 
of  his  sufferings.  Is  he  speaking  only  figura- 
tively of  the  fierce  opposition  of  men  as 
savage  as  beasts ;  or  is  he  referring  to  an 
actual  exposure  to  wild  beasts  in  the  theatre  ? 
If  the  latter,  it  seems  strange  that  Luke 
should  not  have  mentioned  it ;  and  in  itself 
it  is  extremely  unlikely  that  St  Paul,  a  Roman 
citizen,  should  have  been  subjected  to  a 
punishment  usually  reserved  for  slaves  and 
those  captured  in  war.  Besides,  how  could 
he  have  escaped  the  jaws  of  the  wild  beasts  ? 
When,  in  the  second  Corinthian  Epistle,  St 
Paul  is  giving  a  catalogue  of  his  sufferings, 
he  mentions  among  them  no  fight  with  wild 
beasts.  Thus  it  seems  more  reasonable  to 
suppose  that  he  is  speaking  metaphorically 
of  his  contests  with  infuriated  enemies. 

It  is  noteworthy  that  in  the  Epistles  of 
Ignatius  the  phrases  as  to  fighting  with  wild 
beasts   are  used   both   in   a   literal  and   in  a 


EPHESUS   AND   ST   PAUL  27 

figurative  way.  Ignatius  was  going  to  Rome 
to  be  thrown  to  wild  beasts,  and  this  form 
of  martyrdom  he  willingly  accepts.  But  he 
also  speaks  of  a  daily  contest  with  wild  beasts 
in  human  form,  that  is,  the  Roman  soldiers 
who  accompanied  him. 

In  any  case  the  wild  beasts  with  whom 
the  Apostle  fought  cannot  be  the  party  of 
Demetrius  the  silversmith,  as  immediately 
after  his  encounter  with  them  he  left  Ephesus, 
and  the  first  Corinthian  Epistle,  which  was 
dated  from  Ephesus,  must  have  been  written 
some  time  before  this. 

We  hear  comparatively  little  of  St  Paul's 
relations  with  the  Ephesian  Church  after  he 
had  left  the  city.  He  does  not  seem  to  have 
maintained  with  it  the  close  relations  which 
united  him,  for  example,  with  the  Church 
at  Corinth.  Yet  a  few  rays  of  light  fall  on 
the  connection. 

We  have  a  very  interesting  glimpse  at  these 
relations,  afforded  us  a  little  before  the  Apostle's 
imprisonment,  in  his  beautiful  address  to  the 
Presbyters  of  the  Church  when  he  met  them 
at  Miletus.  None  of  the  speeches  attributed 
by  the  author  of  Acts  to  St  Paul  is  so  touching 
as  this.  The  Apostle  reminds  the  Presbyters 
how  he  had  lived  and  toiled  among  them  for 
three  years,  working  with  his  hands  that  he 


28  THE    EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

might  not  depend  on  their  charity,  and  preach- 
ing the  doctrine  of  faith  in  Christ.  He 
mentions  the  persecutions  which  he  had  en- 
dured at  the  hands  of  the  Jews  ;  but,  curiously, 
he  does  not  speak  of  the  dangerous  persecution 
by  the  votaries  of  Artemis.  He  goes  on :  "I 
know  that  after  my  departing  grievous  wolves 
shall  enter  in  among  you,  not  sparing  the 
flock ;  and  from  among  your  own  selves  shall 
men  arise,  speaking  perverse  things,  to  draw 
away  disciples  after  them."  Probably  the 
author  of  Acts  has  slightly  changed  the 
character  of  these  sayings,  which  would  be 
more  probably  uttered  in  the  way  of  warning 
than  of  prophecy.  In  any  case,  they  show 
that  before  long,  after  St  Paul's  farewell,  there 
was  a  conflict  in  the  Church,  and  a  revolt 
against  the  doctrine  preached  by  St  Paul. 
We  shall  see  that  this  testimony  as  to  inner 
struggles  in  the  Church  of  Ephesus  is  con- 
firmed somewhat  later  by  another  witness, 
the  writer  of  the  Apocalypse. 

Of  all  the  speeches  of  St  Paul  given  in 
Acts,  this  one  bears  by  far  the  clearest  marks 
of  authenticity.1  It  is  from  the  we  narrative, 
professedly  written   by   an    eye-witness ;   and 

1  I  have  enlarged  on  this  subject  in  a  paper  on  "  The 
Speeches  of  St  Paul  in  Acts,"  in  Cambridge  Biblical  Essays, 
1909. 


EPHESUS   AND   ST   PAUL  29 

while  the  phrases  used  by  St  Paul  have  close 
parallels  in  his  recognised  Epistles,  the  whole 
scheme  of  the  discourse  also  bears  marks  of 
having  been  written  down  from  memory,  after 
a  considerable  interval,  by  an  auditor.  It  is 
a  scene  fresh  from  the  life  of  the  early  Church, 
and  bearing  eloquent  testimony  to  the  personal 
charm  of  the  Apostle,  and  the  love  borne  to 
him  by  his  converts. 

This  fact  makes  its  testimony  the  more 
valuable.  It  shows  how  slight  is  the  narrative 
of  the  Pauline  doings  in  Acts,  the  writer  of 
which  work,  like  ancient  historians  in  general, 
prefers  to  narrate  in  detail  one  or  two  striking 
scenes,  painted  in  vivid  colours,  rather  than  to 
give  a  complete  and  balanced  history  of  events. 
It  also  throws  a  light  of  great  value  on  the 
early  history  of  Christian  church  organisation. 
The  representatives  of  the  Church  at  Ephesus, 
who  are  summoned  to  Miletus,  are  the 
Presbyters,  who  may  be  a  sort  of  committee 
of  management  of  the  society,  or  very  possibly 
may  have  been  merely  the  most  important 
members  of  it.  The  picture  which  is  vividly 
depicted  in  2  Corinthians  exhibits  the  Church 
at  Corinth  as  a  pure  democracy,  only  those 
being  eminent  among  the  disciples  who  had 
some  special  spiritual  gift,  while  the  Apostle 
himself  presides  over  it,  rather  in  virtue  of  his 


30  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

special  endowments  and  his  services  as  Founder 
than  as  having  any  regular  commission.  But 
the  Presbyters  of  Ephesus  are  addressed  by 
the  Apostle  as  being  also  Bishops  or  overseers 
of  the  Church.  They  were  such  in  virtue  of 
the  gifts  bestowed  upon  them  by  the  Spirit : 1 
"  Tend  the  flock  of  which  the  Holy  Spirit  has 
made  you  shepherds."  The  passage,  even  if  it 
stood  alone,  as  of  course  it  does  not,  would  be 
quite  conclusive  against  the  truth  of  the  view 
that  St  Paul  set  up  in  the  churches  which  he 
founded  a  single  bishop  to  exercise  supreme 
functions.  The  Presbyters  were  not  appointed 
by  him,  but  by  the  Spirit,  as  was  Matthias, 
when  it  was  considered  necessary  to  elect  an 
apostle  in  the  place  of  Judas  Iscariot ;  and 
none  of  them  had  a  position  of  special 
prerogative. 

It  is  perhaps  legitimate  to  regard  the  differ- 
ence between  the  constitution  of  the  Church 
at  Corinth  and  that  at  Ephesus  as  indicative 
of  the  different  political  conditions  of  the  two 
cities.  Corinth  was  a  Roman  colony :  the 
chief  magistrates  were  duoviri,  many  of  whose 
names  have  been  preserved  to  us  on  the  coins 
of  the  city :  the  municipal  organisation  was 
based  on  that  of  Rome.  But  Ephesus,  like 
all  the  great  cities  of  Ionia,  played  at  being 

1  Acts  xx.  28. 


EPHESUS    AND   ST   PAUL  31 

free,  had  a  senate  and  a  popular  assembly,  and 
a  variety  of  magistrates  with  high-sounding 
titles,  but  not  much  power.  The  churches  of 
Asia  seem  to  have  copied  the  organisation  of 
the  cities  in  which  they  dwelt. 

The  Epistle  of  St  Paul  inscribed  To  the 
Ephesians  is  of  later  date  than  the  farewell- 
scene  last  mentioned.  The  subscription  says 
that  it  was  sent  from  Rome.  Whether  it  is  a 
genuine  Epistle  of  the  Apostle  is  a  very  diffi- 
cult question.  Certainly  its  theology  is  some- 
what more  developed  than  that  of  the  other 
Epistles,  and  developed  in  a  particular  direc- 
tion. It  shows  more  influence  of,  or  at  all 
events  more  kinship  to,  the  mystic  religions  of 
Asia  Minor.  A  view  adopted  by  some  of  the 
best  critics,  to  which  I  am  prepared  to  adhere, 
is  that  it  is  one  copy  of  a  circular  letter  ad- 
dressed by  St  Paul,  during  his  imprisonment 
at  Rome,  to  several  of  the  great  cities  of  Asia 
Minor.1  Its  great  similarity  to  the  Epistle  to 
the  Colossi  cms,  which  is  generally  regarded  as 
authentic,  seems  to  be  in  its  favour.  That  it 
was  originally  addressed  to  the  Ephesians  is 
more  than  doubtful.  In  any  case,  it  does  not 
help  us  with  any  facts  as  to  the  religious 
history  of  Ephesus.  There  is  in  it  nothing 
which  has  reference  to  the  particular  history 

1  See  Moffatt,  Literature  of  the  X.T.,  p.  392. 


32  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

and  circumstances  of  the  Church  in  that 
city. 

On  the  other  hand,  some  of  the  best  critics 
regard  the  last  chapter  of  the  Epistle  to  the 
Romans  as  a  fragment  of  a  letter  to  the 
Ephesians.  It  is  clearly  out  of  place.  A 
number  of  the  persons  to  whom  greetings  were 
sent  in  it  could  not  well  have  been  at  Rome 
at  the  time  when  St  Paul  was  working  in 
Greece  and  Asia.  Prisca  and  Aquila  are 
clearly  the  Priscilla  and  Aquila  who  are  men- 
tioned in  Acts  as  having  been  expelled  from 
Rome,  and  having  met  St  Paul  at  Corinth, 
whence  they  preceded  him  to  Ephesus  ;  and 
the  whole  long  list  of  greetings  seems  to  show 
that  the  letter  which  contained  them  must 
have  been  written  to  a  city  where  St  Paul  had 
long  dwelt,  and  in  which  he  had  many  friends. 
This  is  the  latest  direct  evidence  which  we 
have  as  to  the  relations  of  St  Paul  to  the  great 
city  of  Asia.  But  we  are  able  to  draw,  from 
the  Ephesian  literature  which  is  discussed  in 
the  next  chapter,  certain  inferences  as  to  the 
conflict  of  Pauline  and  other  tendencies  towards 
the  end  of  the  first  and  the  beginning  of  the 
second  century. 

It  is  not  to  be  supposed  that  the  religious 
atmosphere  of  Ephesus  greatly  influenced 
St  Paul.     He  came  to  Ephesus,  as  is  proved 


EPHESUS   AND   ST  PAUL  33 

by  the  Epistles  to  the  Corinthians  sent  thence 
to  Greece,  with  his  religious  beliefs  fully 
formed.  The  doctrine  of  the  Exalted  Christ, 
of  which  he  was  the  great  champion,  arose 
early  out  of  the  Christian  consciousness,  and 
certainly  did  not  first  arise  on  Greek  soil.  But 
we  can  understand  how  the  Pauline  doctrine 
found  in  the  great  Ionian  city  a  very  fertile 
soil,  where  it  could  speedily  take  root  and 
grow  into  a  great  tree.  It  would  naturally 
find  a  far  speedier  welcome  there  than  in  the 
conservative  Jewish  soil  of  Jerusalem.  And 
if  there  is  one  thing  which  is  made  clear  by 
the  history  in  Acts,  it  is  that  the  Hellenistic 
Greeks  were  far  more  ready  to  accept  and  to 
develop  the  Pauline  teaching  than  were  the 
Jews,  even  the  Jews  of  the  Dispersion,  who 
had  been  greatly  influenced  by  their  Hellenic 
neighbours.  Everywhere  he  found  friends  and 
disciples  among  the  Greeks,  while  among  the 
Jews  he  found  a  few  ardent  followers,  but 
numerous  and  bitter  opponents.  This  was 
notably  the  case  at  Ephesus.  On  the  other 
hand,  some  of  the  later  shoots  which  sprang 
from  the  Christian  roots,  such  as  the  Logos 
doctrine  and  the  worship  of  the  Virgin  M other, 
did  owe  much  to  the  influence  of  the  atmos- 
phere of  the  Ionian  cities  of  the  coast. 


Ill 

EPHESUS   AFTER   ST   PAUL 

The  message  to  the  Church  of  Ephesus  in 
the  Apocalypse,  especially  if  combined  with 
St  Paul's  address  to  the  Elders  of  Ephesus 
in  Acts,  gives  us  certain  data  for  the  history 
of  Ephesus  in  a.d.  60-90.  It  is  quite  clear 
that  in  that  city  the  key  to  the  situation  is 
the  bitter  contest  between  the  narrower  or 
Judaic  and  the  broader  or  Universalist  party. 
Luke,  writing  many  years  after  St  Paul's 
speech  to  the  Elders,  which  took  place  about 
a.d.  55,  has  probably  somewhat  coloured  it, 
though  in  the  main  the  report  seems  historical. 
I  have  already  called  attention x  to  two  points 
in  particular.  First,  whereas,  according  to 
Acts,  St  Paul's  troubles  at  EphesUs  arose 
mainly  from  the  opposition  of  the  pagan 
makers  of  shrines  of  the  goddess  Artemis,  in 
his  address  he  does  not  mention  the  pagans, 

1  Above,  p.  25. 

34 


EPHESUS   AFTER   ST  PAUL  35 

but  speaks  only  of  the  plots  of  the  Jews.  And, 
second,  he  warns  his  hearers  that  they  will  be 
in  danger  from  grievous  wolves  who  will  enter 
in,  and  not  spare  the  flock.  We  know  that 
the  wolves  with  whom  St  Paul  was  all  his 
life  contending  were  the  Judaising  party. 

In  the  Apocalypse  we  find  the  reverse,  the 
other  side  of  the  same  history.  There  we 
read  that  the  Church  had  suffered  from  the 
incoming  of  men  who  claimed  to  be  Apostles, 
but  were  not,  and  had  finally  rejected  them. 
Also  that  there  was  in  the  city  a  sect  of 
Nicolaitans,  whom  also  the  Church  rejected. 
Yet  the  author  does  not  regard  the  victory 
over  these  his  enemies  as  secure :  the  zeal  of 
the  community  is  growing  cooler,  and  the 
Church  is  still  in  danger.  The  chief  person 
of  whom  we  know  that  he  claimed  to  be  an 
Apostle,  while  that  claim  was  by  many  re- 
jected, is  St  Paul.  St  Paul  laboured  long  in 
Ephesus,  and  was  the  founder  of  the  Church 
there,  but  he  foresaw  that  there  would  come 
a  reaction,  and  that  the  Jews  who  had  worked 
against  him  in  the  city  would  find  a  footing 
in  the  Church,  and  do  it  harm.  Against  them 
the  Apostle  tries  to  arm  his  friends  by  point- 
ing out  how  free  he  had  been  from  all  personal 
and  unworthy  motive.  Yet  it  cannot  be 
doubted,    considering     how    completely     the 


36  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

Pauline  connection  of  Ephesus  is  set  aside  in 
the  local  traditions,  that  the  Judaising  party 
afterwards  for  a  time  gained  the  upper  hand. 
That  the  writer  of  the  Apocalypse  was  on 
their  side  is  clear,  not  only  from  the  strongly 
Judaic  cast  of  the  whole  book,  but  especially 
from  the  message  to  the  neighbouring  Church 
at  Smyrna,  that  a  plague  of  that  Church  is 
a  party  which  claims  to  be  Jewish,  but  is  not, 
but  is  a  very  synagogue  of  Satan.  It  seems 
no  doubt  absurd  that  the  followers  of  St  Paul 
should  be  spoken  of  as  a  party  who  claimed 
to  be  Jewish :  such  a  charge  could  only  be 
brought  against  them  by  one  blinded  by  party 
zeal.  But  yet  one  can  understand  such  a 
charge,  seeing  how  earnestly  St  Paul  claims 
for  the  Church  of  Christ  that  it  is  the  true 
Israel,  the  spiritual  successor  of  the  Jewish 
nation.  A  writer  like  the  author  of  the 
Apocalypse  might  regard  St  Paul's  spiritual 
Israel  as  a  worthless  and  etiolated  thing,  a 
ghost  without  the  blood  of  life.  We  are  not 
unaccustomed  in  our  days  to  criticism  of  this 
kind.  And  anyone  who  converses  on  the 
subject  with  modern  Jews  will  find  with  what 
intense  antipathy  the  Pauline  views  fill  them, 
sometimes  even  after  their  conversion  to 
Christianity. 

The  Nicolaitans  are  unknown  to  us  except 


EPHESUS    AFTER   ST   PAUL  37 

from  the  Apocalypse.  They  must  have  been 
the  followers  of  one  Nicolas.  It  is  a  very 
attractive  conjecture  that  this  Nicolas  was  the 
proselyte  of  Antioch,  who  was,  with  Philip 
Stephen  and  others,  named  as  one  of  the  first 
set  of  deacons  (Acts  vi.  5).  All  these  deacons 
had  pure  Greek  names.1  Philip  and  Stephen, 
as  we  know,  were  progressives ;  and  we  can 
scarcely  suppose  that  a  proselyte  of  Antioch 
would  take  an  opposite  line  to  theirs.  Between 
Antioch  and  Ephesus  at  that  time  relations 
were  close ;  and  it  would  be  by  no  means 
strange  that  a  member  of  the  broad  and  liberal 
party  at  Antioch  should  have  founded  a 
party  at  Ephesus.  We  can  easily  understand 
how  hateful  such  a  party  would  be  to  the' 
author  of  the  Apocalypse.  He  would  regard 
it  much  as  the  hard-and-fast  churchmen  of  our 
day  regard  the  party  which  advocates  reinter- 
pretation  and  comprehension. 

It  is  difficult  to  say  what  would  be  the 
relations  between  the  Nicolaitans  and  the 
Pauline  party.  Certainly  we  need  not  identify 
the  two :  rather  we  may  suppose  that  the 
Nicolaitans  were  the  advanced  or  liberal  wing 


1  It  seems  very  strange  that  so  thoroughly  Greek  a  set 
of  men  should  have  been  living  at  Jerusalem ;  but  it  was 
to  attend  to  the  affairs  of  Hellenist  converts  that  they  were 
appointed. 


38  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

of  the  Pauline  party.  We  know  that  several 
ultra-Pauline  parties  sprang  up  in  the  early 
Church,  the  most  noted  of  them  being  the 
party  of  Marcion,  which  was  generally  regarded 
as  heretical :  Marcion  may  have  carried  further 
the  views  of  the  Nicolaitans.  At  the  time 
when  the  Apocalypse  was  written,  the  party 
of  Nicolas  seems  to  have  been  in  an  oppressed 
condition.  But,  whatever  came  of  it,  the 
liberal  or  Pauline  tendency  in  the  Church  was 
never  eclipsed.  This  is  clearly  shown  by  the 
issue  from  it  of  the  Fourth  Gospel,  the  author 
of  which  goes  even  beyond  St  Paul  in  his 
ideas  of  the  universality  of  the  faith  of  Christ. 
Thus  the  narrower  and  the  broader  parties 
alternated  in  their  control  of  the  society  at 
Ephesus.  The  reaction  against  the  exaggera- 
tions of  Baur  has  led  many  recent  writers  to 
deny  that  the  contest  between  the  Judaising 
and  the  broader  party  gives  us  the  clue  to  the 
early  history  of  the  Christian  Church  ;  but 
these  writers  in  turn  exaggerate.  If  we  must 
take  one  clue  as  dominant,  it  can  be  only  that 
set  forth  by  Baur.  Only  it  is  almost  always  a 
mistake  to  confine  oneself  to  one  explanation 
of  a  complicated  history. 

There  is  a  considerable  post-Pauline  Chris- 
tian literature  which  is  connected  with  Ephesus. 
The  earliest  example  of  it  is  the  Apocalypse. 


EPHESUS   AFTER   ST   PAUL  39 

Next  come  the  Second  and  Third  Epistles 
attributed  to  John ;  then  the  Fourth  Gospel, 
with  which  goes  the  First  Epistle. 

Those  who  wish  to  see  this  literature  treated 
as  a  whole,  with  an  account  of  the  views  of 
modern  theologians  as  to  the  date  and  author- 
ship of  the  several  books,  cannot  do  better 
than  read  Dr  Moffatt's  Introduction  to  the 
Literature  of  the  New  Testament,  or  the 
equally  lucid  Introduction  of  Dr  Jiilicher, 
translated  into  English.  Both  of  these  writers 
are  men  of  great  learning  and  great  sobriety 
of  judgment.  I  shall  not  attempt  to  go  over 
the  ground  which  they  so  admirably  occupy : 
critical  questions  I  only  discuss  in  order  to 
define  the  position  which  is  taken  up  in  the. 
present  work.  When  I  treat  of  the  Gospel, 
I  shall  make  a  statement  of  my  view  of  its 
authorship.     Here  I  may  premise  a  few  words. 

The  traditional  view  which  gives  all  the 
writings  which  I  have  mentioned  to  one 
author,  and  that  one  John  the  son  of  Zebedee, 
is  quite  unmaintainable,  and  is  not  now  main- 
tained by  many  critics.  That  it  should  have 
arisen  in  an  uncritical  age  is  not  surprising. 
There  is  a  well-known  tendency  in  the  world 
to  attribute  books,  as  well  as  other  works  of 
art,  such  as  statues  and  paintings,  to  the  most 
noted  of  the  persons  with  whom  they  seem  to 


40  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

have  some  connection.  The  author  of  the 
Apocalypse  gives  his  name  as  John,  and  he 
wrote  before  the  end  of  the  first  century. 
The  Fourth  Gospel,  except  the  conclusion,  is 
stated  in  the  Gospel  itself  to  embody  the 
testimony  of  the  Beloved  Disciple ;  and  the 
early  Christian  commentators  had  sufficient 
acumen  to  see  that  the  Beloved  Disciple  must 
be  the  Apostle  John.  This  identification,  it 
is  true,  has  been  denied  by  many  modern 
critics  :  some  have  thought  that  the  Beloved 
Disciple  was  Nathanael,  who  is  not  mentioned 
by  the  Synoptics ;  some  that  he  is  a  merely 
ideal  figure ;  but  in  my  opinion  this  is  a  quite 
unnecessary  mystification.  The  First  Epistle 
is  in  many  respects  closely  akin  to  the  Gospel. 
I  believe  it  to  be  by  the  same  writer ;  but 
this  again  is  a  point  on  which  critics  are  not 
agreed.  I  shall  venture  in  the  following 
pages  to  treat  the  Gospel  and  the  Epistle  as 
by  the  same  man,  for  if  the  author  of  the 
Epistle  is  not  the  Evangelist,  he  is  so  closely 
assimilated  to  him  that  he  may  be  used  to 
explain  and  to  enlarge  points  in  the.  Evan- 
gelist's teaching. 

To  these  statements  and  traditions  1  would 
give  all  the  credence  which  can  be  reasonably 
expected  for  them.  The  author  of  the  Apo- 
calypse was  a  certain  John  of  Ephesus.     At 


EPHESUS    AFTER   ST   PAUL  41 

the  end  of  the  book  (xxii.  9),  the  angel  says  to 
the  writer,  "  I  am  of  thy  brethren  the 
prophets."  This  seems  to  imply  that  John 
was  of  the  order  of  the  prophets  or  preachers, 
a  distinct  class  of  men  in  the  early  Church. 
Now  St.  Paul,  in  his  first  Corinthian  Epistle, 
classifying  the  lights  of  the  Church,  puts  the 
Apostles  in  the  first  place,  prophets  in  the 
second,  teachers  in  the  third.1  In  view  of 
this,  it  is  unreasonable  to  suppose  that  the 
man  who  calls  himself  a  prophet  should 
really  have  been  an  apostle.  Thus  the  Apostle 
John  seems  to  be  excluded  from  the  author- 
ship of  the  Apocalypse.  We  may  add  that 
there  is  not  a  single  good  reason  for  such 
an  attribution.  It  is  very  possible  that  the 
Apostle  was  one  of  the  first  Christian  martyrs, 
and  dead  long  before  the  time  of  the  Apo- 
calypse." The  tendencies  of  the  book  are 
those  of  Asia  Minor,  not  those  of  Palestine ; 
and  the  name  John  was  so  common  among 
Jews  that  in  itself  it  can  prove  nothing.  The 
author  of  the  Apocalypse  thus  remains  quite 
unknown  to  us :  we  must  be  content  to  call 
him  "John  the  Prophet." 

There  is  far  more  serious  evidence  to  bring 
into  connection  the  Apostle  John  and  the 
Fourth  Gospel.     In  the  proper  place  I  shall 

1   1  Cor.  xii.  28.  -  See  below,  p.  72. 


42  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

maintain  that,  though  the  Apostle  did  not 
write  the  book,  there  is  in  it  a  great  deal  of 
tradition  which  probably  came  from  him. 
The  Fourth  Gospel  may  fairly  be  called,  as  it 
is  in  our  Bibles,  the  Gospel  according  to  John. 
But  the  real  author  was  a  man  of  independent 
genius,  who  has  chosen  to  remain  anonymous. 
To  this  same  author  we  attribute  the  First 
Epistle ;  but  in  writing  it  he  was  dependent 
on  no  tradition,  but  followed  entirely  the  bent 
of  his  own  character.  It  certainly  bears  the 
marks  of  being  a  work  of  the  old  age  of  the 
writer ;  garrulous  and  monotonous,  though 
full  of  the  sweetest  Christian  spirit. 

As  to  the  Second  and  Third  Epistles,  they 
are  both  by  one  author,  who  calls  himself  the 
Elder.  Almost  certainly  he  was  not  the  son 
of  Zebedee ;  for  an  apostle  would  scarcely 
call  himself  a  presbyter  or  elder,  any  more  than 
he  would  call  himself  a  prophet.  There  is,  in 
fact,  no  certain  proof  that  his  name  was  John, 
for  we  are  compelled  to  reject  the  view  that 
he  was  the  John  who  wrote  the  Apocalypse : 
and  there  is  little  to  be  said  in  favour  of 
the  view  that  he  was  the  man  who  wrote 
the  Gospel.  There  is,  however,  considerable 
evidence  of  the  residence  at  Ephesus,  in  the 
first  century,  of  a  certain  John  called  John 
the  Elder,  a  tradition  mounting  to  the  time 


EPHESUS   AFTER   ST   PAUL  43 

of  Papias.  It  is,  therefore,  with  considerable 
probability  that  we  can  regard  this  John  as 
the  author  of  the  Second  and  Third  Epistles. 
These  two  letters,  however,  are  so  simple  in 
their  contents,  that  it  is  hard  to  find  con- 
clusive arguments  either  for  or  against  any 
identification.  Nor  is  the  question  one  which 
is  important  for  the  purposes  of  the  present 
book.  It  must  have  been  some  unknown 
circumstance  which  caused  the  inclusion  of 
letters  so  slight  and  occasional  in  the  New 
Testament. 

To  sum  up :  we  find  at  Ephesus  a  veritable 
confusion  of  Johns.  Tradition  makes  John 
the  Apostle  reside  there,  and  it  is  more  than 
probable  that  the  Fourth  Gospel  contains 
traditions  which  derive  from  him.  John  the 
Elder  probably  wrote  the  Second  and  Third 
Epistles.  John  the  Prophet  wrote  the 
Apocalypse.  That  the  actual  writer  of  the 
Fourth  Gospel  and  the  First  Epistle  was 
named  John  there  is  no  evidence ;  but  if  this 
were  the  case,  it  would  help  in  a  measure  to 
explain  the  general  confusion.  In  regard  to 
this  writer,  in  view  of  the  untrustworthiness  of 
tradition,  we  have  to  fall  back  on  the  internal 
evidence.  To  this  question  we  return  in  the 
next  chapter. 

The  Johannine    Apocalypse  is  a  document 


44  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

with  which  criticism  has  dealt  on  the  whole 
very  effectively.  Its  date  appears  to  be  in  the 
reign  of  Domitian,  about  a.d.  90.  However, 
the  person  who,  in  our  day,  could  suppose 
the  Prophet  who  wrote  the  Apocalypse  and 
the  person  who  wrote  the  Gospel  to  be  the 
same  would  show  himself  to  be  destitute  of 
the  critical  faculty.  It  is  true  that  there  are 
certain  small  points  of  resemblance  between 
the  two.  Some  peculiarities  of  expression  are 
common  to  both.  And  the  phrase  "  Word 
of  God  "  which  figures  so  prominently  in  the 
proem  to  the  Gospel  is  in  the  Apocalypse 
applied  also  to  a  person,  the  rider  on  the  white 
horse  (xix.  13),  on  whose  garment  was  written 
the  title  "  King  of  Kings  and  Lord  of  Lords." 
But  this  only  indicates  that  the  two  writers 
belonged  to  one  period  and  one  region.  The 
character  and  spirit  of  the  two  are  as  different 
as  it  is  possible  to  imagine.  The  Prophet 
was  a  devoted  Jew,  in  the  succession  of  the 
old  prophets  of  Israel,  a  materialist  and  a 
preacher  of  the  coming  end  of  the  world. 
The  Evangelist,  although  of  Jewish  race, 
belonged  to  the  extreme  wing  of  those  who 
adapted  Christianity  to  the  Gentile  world; 
he  was  no  prophet,  but  a  philosopher  and  a 
divine,  and  entirely  pervaded  by  the  love  of 
the  spiritual  as  opposed  to  the  material.     He 


EPHESUS   AFTER   ST   PAUL  45 

throws  aside  the  apocalyptic  notions  which 
so  dominate  the  Prophet,  and  substitutes  a 
Second  Coming  and  a  Heaven  of  quite 
another  character.  To  ascribe  two  writings, 
one  of  which  is  fervently  apocalyptic,  while 
the  other  definitely  rejects  apocalyptic  ideas,  to 
the  same  writer  is  a  patent  absurdity.  Even 
the  style  of  the  two  authors  is  quite  different : 
the  Evangelist  writes  in  a  style  which  is 
peculiar,  but  quite  literary ;  the  Prophet  in  a 
strange  Hebraic  dialect,  expressive  indeed,  but 
quite  unclassical. 

In  spite  of  the  intense  Judaism  which 
appears  in  some  passages  of  the  Apocalypse, 
especially  in  those  relating  to  the  New 
Jerusalem,  yet  one  feels  that  this  nationalism 
is  very  different  from  that  of  Judrea,  more 
poetical,  more  imaginative,  of  wider  outlook. 
And  it  is  largely  mixed  with  ideas  taken 
from  other  religious  sources.  As  Moffatt  well 
observes,  there  are  in  the  book  elements  akin  to 
Zoroastrian,  Babylonian,  Greek,  and  Egyptian 
eschatology  and  cosmology.  This  will  most 
clearly  appear  if  we  compare  the  Johannine 
Apocalypse  with  that  very  interesting  Pagan 
Apocalypse  published  by  Dieterich  under  the 
somewhat  misleading  title  of  "A  Mithraic 
liturgy."1  Cumont  has  shown  that  this  docu- 
1   Eine  Mithras  Liturgie. 


46  THE  EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

ment  is  not  primarily  Mithraic,  but  composed 
of  Phrygian  and  Syrian  elements ;  and  it  is 
very  instructive  to  place  side  by  side  many 
passages  from  it  with  parallel  passages  from 
the  Johannine  work.  The  Johannine  book, 
though  the  elements  of  it  are  largely  Jewish 
and  partly  Heathen,  is  yet  a  splendid  work  of 
early  Christian  inspiration,  containing  many 
passages  which  are  among  the  choicest  treasures 
of  the  Christian  Church.  When  it  is  regarded 
from  the  magical  side,  as  a  prophecy  of  the 
future  of  the  world,  it  is  and  has  been  a  source 
of  misleading  and  of  demoralisation.  But 
when  it  is  read  as  a  parable,  as  a  mass  of 
symbolism,  it  is  splendid.  If  we  ask  in  which 
of  these  lights  it  was  likely  to  be  regarded  by 
the  people  of  Ephesus,  the  answer  must  be 
that  the  Ephesians,  like  all  other  communities, 
contained  men  spiritual  and  men  carnal,  men 
inclined  to  the  higher  forms  of  Christianity, 
and  men  given  to  spells  and  magic,  and  each 
of  these  people  would  interpret  the  book  in 
his  own  fashion.  All  the  gifts  of  God  may 
be  used  rightly  or  may  be  abused.  I  may 
mention  one  or  two  touches  of  what  I  would 
venture  to  call  Ephesian  use  in  the  work ;  1 
mean  sayings  which  belong  to  the  atmosphere 
of  the  Pagan  Mysteries.  "  I  will  give  him 
a  white  stone,  and  upon  the  stone  a  new  name 


EPHESUS   AFTER   ST   PAUL  47 

written,  which  no  one  knoweth  save  him  that 
receiveth  it."  The  use  of  amulets  inscribed 
with  mystic  words  was  quite  familiar  to  those 
who  used  "  Ephesian  letters."  Again,  the  way 
in  which  numbers  are  used  is  very  suggestive 
of  Neo-Pythagorean  speculations.  "  He  that 
hath  understanding,  let  him  count  the  number 
of  the  beast ;  his  number  is  six  hundred  and 
sixty  and  six."  Similar  passages  occur  all 
through.  Of  course  one  could  not  say  that 
they  could  only  be  written  at  Ephesus.  They 
would  be  almost  as  appropriate  to  Laodicea  or 
Antioch  ;  but  yet  we  may  say  that  no  city  lay 
more  in  the  full  current  of  mystic  lore  than 
Ephesus. 

To  discuss  the  Apocalypse  in  the  light  of 
comparative  religion,  to  trace  its  sources  and 
its  interpretation,  would  be  a  fascinating  task. 
That  task,  however,  is  in  the  hands  of  very 
able  scholars,  and  I  must  not  turn  aside  to  it, 
but  must  confine  myself  to  the  great  investi- 
gation to  which  this  book  is  devoted — the 
analysis  and  exposition  of  the  Fourth  Gospel. 

Another  glimpse  at  Ephesian  affairs  at  the 
beginning  of  the  second  century  is  afforded 
us  by  the  Epistle  addressed  by  the  venerable 
Ignatius  to  the  Ephesian  Church,  when  he 
was  going  to  martyrdom  at  Rome.  The 
testimony  of  this  Epistle  must  be  used  with 


48  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

caution,  since  it  seems,  even  in  its  more 
authentic  and  shorter  form,  to  have  suffered 
from  interpolation.  We  may,  however,  note 
one  or  two  points.  The  letter  mentions  as 
Bishop  of  Ephesus  a  certain  Onesimus,  whom 
it  is  very  tempting  to  identify  with  the  young 
friend  of  St  Paul  mentioned  in  the  Epistle 
to  Philemon.  That  St  Paul  should  have 
appointed  him  as  Bishop  is  in  the  last  degree 
unlikely :  at  that  time  the  Bishops  were 
selected  by  some  form  of  lottery,  as  in  the 
case  of  Matthias,  or  elected  by  the  community. 
It  is  also  noteworthy  that  the  letter  dwells  on 
the  connection  of  St  Paul  with  Ephesus,  but 
says  nothing  of  any  connection  with  Ephesus 
of  St  John  or  any  of  his  school. 

During  the  second  century,  a  period  of  great 
ferment  in  Christianity,  Ephesus  was  one  of 
the  chief  foci  of  thought.  Our  knowledge  of 
that  century  is  unfortunately  very  fragmentary. 
It  was  at  Ephesus,  according  to  his  own 
account,  that  Justin  the  Christian  philosopher 
held  his  colloquies  with  his  rivals  and  with  the 
Jews.  When  Montanism,  that  revolt  against 
the  growing  secularity  of  the  Church,  arose  in 
Phrygia,  its  influence  was  strong  at  Ephesus, 
as  had  been  for  ages  the  influence  of  the 
Phrygian  religiosity.  Polycarp,  Bishop  of  the 
sister-city  of  Smyrna,  claimed  to  have  been  an 


EPHESUS   AFTER   ST   PAUL  49 

auditor  of  "  John  and  others  who  had  seen  the 
Lord,"  though  whether  he  means  the  Apostle 
John  has  been  a  matter  of  much  dispute.  He 
clearly  carried  on  a  Johannine  tradition  which 
belonged  to  that  region  of  Ionia,  and  which 
was  inherited  by  Ireneeus.  Cerinthus,  the 
earliest  of  the  Gnostics,  lived  at  Ephesus,  and 
a  tradition  makes  him  an  opponent  of  the  son 
of  Zebedee,  while  an  opposed  tradition  even 
makes  Cerinthus  the  author  of  the  Fourth 
Gospel.  To  find  the  facts  in  these  matters  is 
almost  hopeless :  but  one  cannot  doubt  that 
Gnosticism,  like  Montanism,  found  a  fertile 
field  in  the  soil  which  had  once  belonged  to 
the  great  goddess  of  Ephesus. 

Ephesus,  four  hundred  years  after  the  death 
on  the  cross,  was  destined  to  be  the  seat  of 
another  Christian  movement  which  has  been 
of  scarcely  less  importance  to  the  history  of 
the  world  than  was  the  Fourth  Gospel.  In 
Ephesus,  in  a.d.  431,  was  held  the  memorable 
Third  Council  of  the  Church,  in  which  the 
doctrines  of  Nestorius,  or  at  least  what  at  the 
time  were  supposed  to  be  his  doctrines,  were 
condemned,  and  himself  deposed  from  his 
bishopric  and  sent  into  exile.  The  doctrine 
that  Christ  united  two  natures  in  one  person 
was  finally  established  in  the  Church.  These 
decisions  had    no   particular   relation    to    the 

4 


50  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

place  of  the  Council :  they  represent  the 
working  out  of  certain  impulses  of  the  Church 
on  the  lines  of  the  accepted  Greek  philosophy. 
But  one  doctrine  which  had  been  in  a  measure 
opposed  by  Nestorius,  and  which  was  asserted 
by  the  Council,  seems  to  have  deeply  interested 
the  people  of  Ephesus.  It  is  the  so-called 
0cot6kos  doctrine,  that  Mary  was  the  Mother 
of  God.  When  we  learn  that  the  people  of 
Ephesus  greeted  this  doctrine  with  bonfires 
and  rejoicings,  we  cannot  help  remembering 
that  the  Virgin  Mary,  thus  finally  apotheosised, 
in  a  way  succeeded  to  the  honours  of  the 
local  mother-goddess.  Some  authorities  who 
are  well  acquainted  with  the  peasantry  of 
Greece  and  Asia  Minor  think  that  there  is  much 
in  common  between  the  veneration  paid  by 
the  people  of  ancient  Phrygia  to  their  Artemis 
or  Cybele,  and  the  peasant  worship  of  the  local 
Madonnas,  to  whom,  rather  than  to  God,  the 
people  resort  in  trouble  and  perplexity. 

Of  course  1  cannot  say  anything  as  to  the 
effects,  enormous  both  for  good  and  for  evil, 
of  the  final  exaltation  of  the  Mother  of  Christ. 
These  effects  are  written  large  over  the  history 
of  chivalry  in  the  West  and  on  the  Christi- 
anity of  Greece  and  Rome.  The  historian 
observes  the  wonderful  power  of  continuity 
in  religious  history.     He  sees  how  the  virgin 


EPHESUS   AFTER   ST   PAUL  51 

huntress  of  the  Greeks  became  merged  in  the 
Phrygian  deity  of  nature  ;  and  how,  at  a  later 
time,  in  the  same  region,  the  Phrygian  enthusi- 
asm modified  the  Christianity  preached  by  St 
Paul.  It  is  not  the  business  of  the  historian 
as  such  to  estimate  the  values  of  these  phases 
of  religion  :  that  is  a  matter  which  must  be 
settled  by  the  instincts  of  the  living  Church : 
the  question  of  value  is  quite  apart  from  the 
question  of  origin. 


IV 
THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

By  far  the  highest  claim  to  a  great  place  in 
the  history  of  religion  which  Ephesus  possesses 
rests  upon  its  function  as  the  soil  which  pro- 
duced the  Fourth  Gospel.  But  while  all 
would  concede  the  greatness  of  the  Gospel, 
there  is,  as  we  know,  an  immense  mass  of 
controversial  writing  centring  in  it.  The  date, 
the  authorship,  the  composition,  the  tendencies, 
have  been  discussed  at  length  by  a  multitude 
of  able  writers,  many  of  whom  have  given 
their  best  years  to  the  study  of  these  problems. 
No  one  has  a  right  to  publish  a  book  about 
the  Gospel  who  has  not  in  a  measure  surveyed 
this  mass  of  literature.  I  say  "  in  a  measure," 
for  to  master  it  completely  would  be  the  work 
of  many  years,  if  not  of  a  lifetime.1  But  the 
English  reader  who  carefully  considers  B.  W. 

1  A    complete    bibliography    will    Lfe  found  in    Moffatt, 
Introduction,  pp.  515-519. 

52 


THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL  53 

Bacon's  Fourth  Gospel  in  Research  and 
Debate,  Canon  Sanday's  Criticism  of  the 
Fourth  Gospel,  the  Introduction  to  Loisy's 
Quatrieme  Evangile,  or  the  chapters  on  the 
subject  in  Professor  Moffatt's  Introduction  to 
the  Literature  of  the  New  Testament,  will  find 
at  least  clear  and  dispassionate  statements  of 
the  questions  involved  and  the  views  about 
them  held  by  modern  writers. 

If  I  here  entered  upon  this  sea  of  research, 
I  should  violate  the  plan  of  this  Avork,  which 
is  intended  not  for  scholars,  who  can  consult 
the  great  specialists,  but  for  ordinary  persons 
of  good  education.  All  that  I  can  attempt 
is  to  state  the  views  which  commend  them- 
selves to  me,  and  which  are  assumed  in  the 
chapters  which  follow.  But  I  would  ask  the 
reader  to  believe  that  these  views  have  not 
been  formed  hastily,  or  with  a  view  to  sup- 
port ready-made  theories,  but  have  grown 
out  of  my  studies  in  literary  and  religious 
history. 

If  we  except  the  episode  of  the  woman 
taken  in  adultery,  which  is  of  doubtful  authen- 
ticity, the  whole  book  is  of  uniform  character, 
and  is  the  literary  creation  of  a  single  author,  in- 
cluding the  last  chapter,  which  is  of  the  nature 
of  a  supplement.  Who  he  was  will  never 
be  determined  with   certainty.      But  that  he 


54  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

was  John  the  son  of  Zebedee  is  so  improbable, 
that  we  may  regard  this  view  as  set  aside. 
It  is  not  asserted  even  in  the  heading  of  the 
Gospel,  which  only  says  that  it  is  the  Gospel 
according  to  John,  not  that  it  is  the  Gospel 
written  by  John.  It  bears  something  of  the 
same  relation  to  the  Apostle  John  as  the 
Gospel  according  to  Matthew  bears  to  the 
Apostle  Matthew.  As  I  shall  presently  main- 
tain, there  is  in  it  a  Johannine  element.  But 
as  a  literary  composition  it  is  quite  beyond 
the  powers  of  the  fisherman  of  Galilee.  The 
true  author  was  a  highly  educated  Jewish 
Christian,  one  of  the  second  generation  of 
Christians,  who  may  have  listened  to  some 
of  the  Apostles,  and  certainly  came  in  contact 
with  historic  traditions  of  the  Master's  life. 
He  was  in  most  ways  a  follower  of  St  Paul, 
a  Jew  of  the  Dispersion,  resident  at  Ephesus. 
His  work  shows  him  to  have  been  acquainted 
with  the  Synoptic  tradition  in  something  like 
its  present  form.  But  he  seems  to  have  been 
dissatisfied  with  it  on  two  grounds.  First,  he 
thought  it  in  some  points  inconsistent  with  the 
statements  of  a  teacher  or  teachers  with  whom 
he  had  conversed,  and  who  had  in  his  opinion 
truer  views  as  to  certain  events  of  the  great 
biography.  And,  second,  he  thought  that  the 
Synoptists   had   imperfectly    appreciated    the 


THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL  55 

higher  and  more  spiritual  side  of  the  Master's 
teaching.  They  had  been  too  literal,  and  not 
seen  far  enough  beneath  the  surface.  Hence 
his  writing  is  in  a  measure  controversial,  though 
behind  the  controversy  lay  the  great  impulse 
of  his  inspiration,  the  deep  need  which  he  felt 
of  giving  utterance  to  the  profound  religious 
ideas  with  which  he  was  inspired. 

Such  is  the  view  here  taken.  To  establish 
it  in  detail  would  be  impossible  without  long 
argument  and  the  sifting  of  evidence  which 
has  already  been  weighed  and  sifted  a  score  of 
times  by  highly  competent  scholars.  My  object 
will  be  rather  to  illustrate  and  amplify  the 
view  than  to  establish  it.  If  in  the  treatment 
of  the  Gospel  it  works  out  in  a  consistent  way, 
that  will  be  all  that  I  could  expect.  On  one 
point  only  a  few  words  are  needed.  I  have 
called  the  Gospel  the  Ephesian  Gospel,  and  I 
certainly  lay  a  certain  amount  of  stress  on  its 
relation  to  the  religion  and  thought  of  the 
most  important  of  the  Greek  cities  of  Asia 
Minor.  On  this  point  the  evidence  of  tradition 
is  very  strong,  since  the  Ephesian  source  of 
the  Gospel  was  accepted  by  Christian  writers 
from  the  second  century  onwards.  There  is 
no  rival  view  of  any  importance.  And  the 
internal  evidence  is  quite  consistent  with  the 
local  attribution. 


56  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

Every  critic  remarks  in  the  Gospel  a  number 
of  details  which  do  not  seem  in  themselves 
important,  but  which  give  to  the  narrative  an 
air,  which  is  in  fact  somewhat  delusive,  of 
being  a  very  exact  narrative.  These  details 
sometimes  specify  time  or  place.  Such  and 
such  an  event  took  place  at  the  sixth  hour,  or 
the  ninth  hour,  or  the  tenth  hour  ;  such  and 
such  a  journey  or  discourse  took  place  on  the 
next  day,  or  on  the  third  day.  John  was 
baptising  at  /Enon  near  to  Salim :  where  the 
mention  of  the  place  seems  immaterial.  Jesus 
came  to  a  Samaritan  town  called  Sychar,  and 
there  sat  by  a  well.  A  careful  description  is 
given  of  the  pool  of  Bethesda,  which  had  five 
porches.  And  so  forth.  In  a  modern  narrative 
such  exactness  in  unimportant  and  unexplained 
detail  would  be  natural  and  expected,  and 
would  be  regarded  as  a  proof  that  the  writer 
had  access  to  a  diary,  or  some  contemporary 
record.  In  some  of  the  narratives  of  the  New 
Testament,  such  as  the  account  of  St  Paul's 
shipwreck,  we  have  a  wealth  of  detail  which 
convinces  most  readers  of  the  exactness  of  the 
account.  But  in  the  Fourth  Gospel  the  de- 
tails do  not  help  the  narrative :  very  often 
they  seem  quite  superfluous ;  and  one  feels 
that  to  construct  an  exact  and  chronological 
narrative  is  a  notion  quite  foreign  to  the  mind 


THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL  57 

of  the  Evangelist.  The  names  of  places  which 
I  have  mentioned  sometimes  are  not  to  be 
identified  in  ancient  geography,  though  every 
candid  critic  must  allow  that  it  does  not  follow 
that  they  never  existed. 

There  are  two  ways,  and  only  two  ways,  in 
which  this  particularity  in  unessential  detail 
can  be  reasonably  accounted  for.  The  first 
way  is  to  suppose  that  they  have  some  hidden 
and  allegoric  meaning.  In  the  mind  of  the 
writer,  it  is  said,  everything  was  a  type  and 
symbol,  even  the  hour  of  the  day  and  the 
names  of  places.  Critics  have  tried  with  great 
learning  and  ingenuity  thus  to  explain  details. 
And  in  the  notion  there  is  nothing  unreason- 
able. We  know  that  Philo  in  the  same  age 
interpreted  in  mystic  and  allegoric  fashion  all 
the  narratives  of  the  Old  Testament.  And 
St  Paul,  a  far  more  practical  and  level-headed 
man  than  Philo,  regards  the  Fall  of  Adam, 
the  journeyings  of  the  Israelites  in  the  Wilder- 
ness, the  birth  of  Jacob  and  Esau,  as  events 
of  deep  meaning  not  merely  in  their  literal 
acceptance,  but  as  symbolically  interpreted. 
It  is  most  natural  that  the  Evangelist  also 
should  allegorise.  And  few  people  would 
deny  that  in  places  he  does  so.  When,  for 
example,  he  lays  special  stress  on  the  state- 
ment that  when  the  side  of  Jesus  was  pierced 


58  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

with  the  spear,  not  blood  only  issued,  but  blood 
and  water,  and  when  he  speaks  of  this  fact  as 
a  prop  of  faith,  one  cannot  doubt  that  he  re- 
garded it  in  a  symbolic  light.  For  him,  as  for 
the  writer  of  Hcb?*ezvs,  the  sacrifice  of  the 
Paschal  lamb  was  typical  of  the  death  on  the 
cross ;  and  so  in  other  cases,  some  of  which 
will  be  mentioned  in  the  course  of  this  work. 

Those  especially  who  have  studied  the 
writings  of  that  most  difficult  and  elusive 
author,  Philo,  are  apt  to  see  symbolical  mean- 
ings in  the  narratives  of  the  Evangelist. 
Whether  he  was  actually  acquainted  with 
the  works  of  Philo  has  long  been  a  disputed 
point.  Dr  MofFatt  is  convinced  that  he  was. 
He  writes  of  the  Evangelist : *  "  Symbolic  or 
semi-allegorical  meanings  are  not  to  be  ex- 
pected or  detected  in  every  phrase  or  touch  : 
generally,  however,  the  reader  of  the  Gospel 
is  surrounded  by  allusions  which  are  not  always 
obvious  upon  the  surface.  There  is  often  a 
blend  of  subtlety  and  simplicity,  in  which  the 
significance  of  some  expression  is  apt  to  be 
missed,  unless  the  reader  is  upon  the  outlook. 
The  brooding  fulness  of  thought  and  the 
inner  unity  of  religious  purpose  which  fill  the 
book  demand  for  its  interpretation  a  constant 
sensitiveness,  especially  to  the  deeper  meaning 

1  Introduction,  p.  523. 


THE    EPHESIAN    GOSPEL  59 

which  prompted  the  methods  of  contemporary 
religious  speculation  along  the  lines  of  the 
Alexandrian  Jewish  philosophy,  as  represented 
by  Philo."  Mr  Scott  also l  mentions  a  number 
of  points  in  which  the  Evangelist  shows  so 
close  a  likeness  to  the  works  of  Alexandrian 
philosophy  that  we  must  needs  suppose  that 
he  was  influenced  by  it.  But  Mr  Scott  adds, 
with  his  usual  insight :  "  Nevertheless  the 
Alexandrian  influence  is  not  to  be  recognised 
as  primary,  like  that  of  the  Synoptics  or 
Paul.  It  does  not  affect  the  substance  of  the 
Johannine  thought  so  much  as  the  forms 
under  which  it  is  presented."  To  which  I 
would  add  that,  if  the  Ephesian  philosophical 
works  of  the  time  had  come  down  to  us,  it 
is  extremely  likely  that  we  should  have  found 
in  them  far  more  points  of  contact  with  the 
Evangelist  than  we  find  in  Philo.  We  are 
apt  to  forget  that  Alexandria  was  but  one  of 
the  great  cities  of  the  Hellenistic  world,  and 
that  other  cities  also  produced  a  literature 
which  has  unfortunately  perished. 

The  allegorical  method  of  interpretation  can 
seldom  lead  to  results  which  are  certain. 
Unless  one  were  in  very  close  contact  with  the 
mind  of  the  writer,  one  could  seldom  be  sure 
of  the  point  of  his  allegory,  unless  he  stated  it 

1  The  Fourth  GosJ>el,  p.  60. 


60  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

himself.  We  find  that  modern  critics  diverge 
considerably  in  their  attempts  to  read  as 
symbolic  the  details  of  time,  of  place,  and  of 
number  which  are  frequent  in  the  Gospel. 
There  may  be  a  deeper  meaning  in  the  six 
water-pots  of  the  miracle  at  Cana,  in  the  five 
porches  of  the  pool  of  Bethesda,  in  the  hundred 
and  fifty-three  fishes  drawn  from  the  lake. 
But  I  am  quite  content  to  leave  the  search 
for  that  meaning  to  others.  A  simpler  ex- 
planation seems  more  to  be  trusted. 

Sometimes  it  may  readily  be  found  in  the 
desire  to  conform  to  the  words  of  the  great 
prophets  of  Israel.  Those  words  dwelt,  to 
a  degree  which  it  is  hard  for  us  to  realise,  in 
the  minds  of  all  the  Evangelists,  and  guided 
their  pens  constantly.  For  example,  the 
curious  statement  that  the  soldiers  by  the 
cross  of  Jesus  divided  His  garments  into  four 
parts,  and  then  cast  lots  for  the  seamless  chiton 
or  shirt,  can  scarcely  be  taken  as  literal  fact, 
since  it  implies  a  plurality  of  garments  not 
customary.  Some  critics  have  tried  to  find 
a  symbolic  meaning  in  the  "  seamless  robe." 
But  here,  if  we  turn  to  the  words  of  the 
Psalm  as  quoted  by  the  Evangelist,  "  They 
parted  my  garments  among  them,  and  upon 
my  vesture  did  they  cast  lots,"  we  have  at 
once   an    almost    undeniable    explanation    of 


THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL  61 

the  story.     So  it  was  destined  to  be,  and  so 
it  must  have  been. 

Another  probable  and  defensible  view  of 
the  reasons  for  the  insertion  of  details  is 
that  the  Evangelist  had  heard  tales  of  the 
doings  of  Jesus  from  an  eye-witness,  or  the 
disciple  of  an  eye-witness.  We  know  that 
to  tales  thus  told  long  after  the  event,  and 
especially  if  told  by  old  men,  little  details 
of  time  and  place  and  circumstance  naturally 
cling.  Very  often  they  become  altered  with 
time  ;  but  something  of  them  still  adheres, 
just  as  a  few  patches  of  colour  often  remain 
on  a  wall  after  the  fresco  which  had  been 
painted  on  it  has  mostly  disappeared.  This 
is  the  view  on  which,  in  general,  I  am  disposed 
to  rely. 

We  will  take  an  example.  When  Nathanael 
in  the  Fourth  Gospel  comes  to  Jesus,1  the 
Master  says  of  him,  "  Behold  an  Israelite  in- 
deed, in  whom  is  no  guile."  Considering  the 
way  in  which  the  Evangelist  always  speaks  of 
the  Jews,  it  is  difficult  to  regard  this  saying 
otherwise  than  as  one  actually  handed  down 
by  tradition.  The  same  applies  to  what 
follows.  Jesus  says  to  the  new-comer,  "  Be- 
fore Philip  called  thee,  when  thou  wast  under 
the  fig-tree,   I    saw   thee."      Nathanael  is  so 

1  John  i.  47. 


62  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

much  struck  by  this  saying  that  he  becomes 
a  disciple  on  the  spot.  No  explanation  is 
given  of  the  reason  why  the  saying  went  so 
straight  to  the  mark.  The  attempts  of  critics 
to  find  symbolical  meaning  in  this  narrative 
have  not  been  happy  ;  and  the  most  natural 
supposition  is  that  it  happened  to  be  preserved 
in  the  memory  of  one  of  the  Apostles  who 
was  present,  as  a  little  piece  of  wreckage. 

Bishop  Lightfoot  laid  some  stress  on  a 
particular  passage  as  a  proof  of  detailed  tradi- 
tion. The  Evangelist  represents  the  Jews  as 
saying  of  the  temple,  "  Forty  and  six  years 
was  this  temple  in  building."  The  temple 
appears  to  have  been  begun  in  B.C.  20  or  19. 
Forty-six  years  from  that  date  would  fall  in 
a.d.  27  or  28,  that  is,  in  the  time  when  Jesus 
was  teaching ;  and  at  that  time  the  temple 
seems  to  have  been  incomplete.1  This  report 
of  the  Evangelist  fits  in  well  with  the  theory 
I  am  maintaining.  The  number  forty-six 
adhered  to  his  memory,  and  was  preserved 
as  a  fly  is  preserved  in  amber. 

In  the  same  way,  it  is  more  than  probable 
that  some  actual  sayings  of  the  historic  Jesus 
are  set  down  in  the  Gospel.  But  in  allowing 
this,  we  must  proceed  very  cautiously.  That" 
the    long    and    wonderful   discourses   in    the 

1  See  Druimiiond,  The  Fourth  Gospel,  p.  371. 


THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL  63 

Gospel  are  an  accurate  record  of  the  speeches 
of  Jesus  no  one  with  any  sense  of  literary 
style  would  allow.  If  we  compare  them  on 
one  side  with  the  speeches  in  the  Synoptic 
Gospels,'  and  on  the  other  side  with  the 
Johannine  Epistle,  it  will  be  at  once  obvious 
how  much  more  in  them  belongs  to  the 
Evangelist  than  to  his  Master,  and  I  may 
add,  how  evidently  they  belong  to  the  end 
and  not  to  the  first  half  of  the  century.  I 
have  sometimes  tried  to  find  in  them  sen- 
tences which  may  be  the  original  word  of  the 
Saviour  which  was  the  germ  of  the  speeches. 
But  such  an  attempt  has  usually  broken  down, 
for  the  germ  turns  out  to  belong  to  post- 
crucifixion  times,  as  well  as  its  amplification. 
Nevertheless,  here  arid  there  one  finds  sayings 
which  have  the  air  of  authenticity,  and  which 
commonly  the  Evangelist  has  somewhat  trans- 
posed. We  may  take,  as  an  example,  the 
saying  which  comes  twice  over  in  the  Gospel 1 
as  to  the  lifting  up  or  exaltation  of  the  Son 
of  Man.  The  words  vary ;  but  some  such 
speech  may  well  have  come  to  the  writer 
from  his  Apostolic  authority.  It  is  interesting 
to  see  that  he  interprets  them  in  two  ways : 
first  literally  and  then  more  broadly.  In  one 
place  he  regards  the  saying  as  a  mere  prophecy 

1  iii.  14;  xii.  32-34. 


64  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

of  the  lifting  up  on  the  cross  ;  but  in  another 
he  adds  a  thoroughly  Johannine  interpreta- 
tion :  "  So  must  the  Son  of  Man  be  lifted  up, 
that  whosoever  believeth  may  in  him  have 
eternal  life."  This  is  the  voice  of  Christian 
experience. 

Nowhere  is  the  possession  by  the  Evangelist 
of  a  definite  tradition  more  clear  than  in  that 
passage  in  the  supplement  (ch.  xxi.  22)  in 
which  the  rumour  current  among  the  Chris- 
tians that  the  beloved  disciple  should  not  die 
before  the  second  coming  of  his  Lord  is  con- 
troverted. "  This  saying  therefore  went  forth 
among  the  brethren,  that  that  disciple  should 
not  die :  yet  Jesus  said  not  unto  him  that  he 
should  not  die  ;  but,  If  I  will  that  he  tarry 
till  I  come,  what  is  that  to  thee  ? "  It  is 
difficult  to  resist  the  impression  that  on  some 
occasion,  perhaps  not  that  mentioned  in  the 
context,  Jesus  did  utter  these  very  words  in 
regard  to  the  Apostle,  and  that  an  auditor 
repeated  them  to  the  Evangelist.  If  any 
reader  has  confidence  in  his  power  of  discern- 
ing beneath  other  words  of  the  Evangelist 
actual  sayings  of  the  historic  Jesus,  he  engages 
in  a  most  legitimate  task,  in  which  success 
will  be  very  valuable. 

Another  motive  which  is  usually  attributed 
to    the    Evangelist    is    a    controversial    one. 


THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL  65 

Here  we  are  on  surer  ground,  and  less  likely 
to  be  warped  by  mere  subjective  tendencies 
— those  tendencies  which  make  us  all  more 
disposed  to  regard  as  actual  words  of  the 
Founder  the  sayings  which  we  most  highly 
value.  Every  book  of  the  New  Testament 
contains  a  certain  amount  of  controversy.  It 
was  impossible  for  the  writers  to  set  forth 
their  views  as  to  the  Person  and  work  of 
their  Master  without  at  the  same  time  attack- 
ing the  views  of  those  who  felt  differently. 
In  Matthew's  Gospel  there  is  much  contro- 
versy with  those  who  denied  that  Jesus  was 
the  Messiah.  In  Acts  there  is  much  contro- 
versy with  those  who  taught  that  Gentile 
converts  must  keep  the  Law  of  Moses.  The 
Fourth  Evangelist  has  strong  opinions  as  to 
the  Person  of  his  Master,  and  in  setting  them 
forth,  he  naturally  attacks  the  teaching  of 
those  of  opposite  opinions.  In  the  First 
Epistle  of  John,  almost  certainly  written  by 
the  Evangelist,  he  breaks  out  into  open  con- 
troversy :  "  Who  is  the  liar,  but  he  that  denieth 
that  Jesus  is  the  Christ  ?  This  is  the  anti- 
christ, even  he  that  denieth  the  Father  and 
the  Son."  . 

But  though  it  is  fair  and  natural  to  examine 
every  chapter  of  the  Gospel  in  order  to  see 
not  only  what  doctrines  the  writer  supports, 


66  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

but  also  what  doctrines  he  denies,  yet  it  is 
possible  to  apply  this  useful  key  to  locks 
which  it  does  not  fit.  In  particular,  I  think 
the  notion  that  the  Evangelist  had  before  him, 
as  he  wrote,  the  texts  of  the  three  earlier 
Gospels,  and  that  he  endeavours  at  every 
point  to  correct  and  supplement  them,  has 
been  carried  too  far.  Such  a  course  would  be 
natural  in  a  modern  writer,  who  would  have 
the  earlier  texts  lying  open  on  his  desk,  and 
would  refer  to  them  every  minute.  But 
such  a  course  would  not  be  natural  to  an 
ancient  writer,  save  he  were  a  literary  man 
like  Plutarch  or  Pliny.  The  Evangelist  is 
primarily  positive,  not  negative  :  he  writes  from 
the  abundance  of  the  heart,  not  in  a  critical 
vein.  In  many  of  the  cases  in  which  he  is 
supposed  to  be  correcting  Matthew  or  Luke, 
I  think  he  is  only  transposing  into  his  own 
key  the  traditional  narrative.  It  is  likely 
that,  when  he  wrote,  the  Gospels  were  current 
at  Ephesus.  He  had  doubtless  often  heard 
parts  of  them  read.  H  e  was  not  satisfied  with 
them,  because  he  thought  that  the  view  which 
they  took  of  the  Person  and  sayings  of  Jesus 
was  literal  and  materialist.  Sometimes  he  was 
able  to  correct  or  supplement  them  in  detail, 
by  the  help  of  oral  tradition  which  had  come 
down  to  him  from  a  particular  source.     More 


THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL  67 

often  he  preferred  to  narrate  tales  which  they 
had  omitted.  But  in  every  case,  he  trans- 
muted everything  in  the  light  which  came 
to  him  from  the  experience  of  the  Church, 
and  from  the  personal  revelation  which  he, 
like  St  Paul,  supposed  himself  to  have  received 
from  the  exalted  Head  of  the  Church. 

My  view  on  the  whole  nearly  coincides  with 
that  of  one  of  the  most  judicious  as  well  as 
learned  of  recent  writers,  Dr  Moffatt : 1  "  The 
least  objectionable  hypothesis  lies  among  those 
which  postulate  ...  a  certain  oral  tradition 
upon  the  life  of  Jesus  which  had  hitherto 
flowed  apart  from  the  ordinary  channels  of 
evangelic  composition."  In  a  word,  the  Evan- 
gelist had  a  source  of -information  derived  from 
the  teaching  of  one  of  the  Apostles,  whether 
he  had  himself  listened  to  him,  or  had  only 
been  a  hearer  of  some  of  those  who  repeated 
his  words.  This  view  may  in  fact  be  regarded 
as  the  most  natural  one ;  and  to  it  many  of 
the  best  critics  incline.  It  may  be  held  in  a 
variety  of  forms,  from  that  of  H.  Holtzmann, 
who  holds  that  elements  in  the  narrative  look 
like  reminiscences  without  regard  to  dogma, 
to  that  of  H.  H.  Wendt,  who  thinks  that  it  is 
the  speeches  in  the  Gospel  which  are  derived 
from    an     earlier   written   source,    while    the 

1  Introduction,  p.  562. 


68  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

narrative  is  a  freer  composition.  A.  Harnack 
also  thinks  that  in  some  way  or  other  John  the 
son  of  Zebedee  stands  behind  the  Evangelist. 
The  view  of  Wendt  seems  to  me  a  precise 
transposition  of  the  truth :  yet  it  is  curious 
that  I  could  accept  his  concluding  chapter 
with  small  modifications.1 

Some  of  the  statements  in  the  Synoptic 
Gospels  the  Evangelist  does  certainly  seem 
intentionally  to  correct.  The  date  at  which 
Jesus  carried  out  the  cleansing  of  the  Temple 
at  Jerusalem  and  the  date  of  the  imprison- 
ment of  John  the  Baptist  are  altered  by  him. 
In  these  cases  there  is  no  visible  reason  of 
symbolism  or  doctrine  for  the  correction :  it 
seems  to  be  the  result  of  a  variety  in  the 
tradition.  He  states  that  Jesus  bore  his  own 
cross  to  Golgotha.2  Mark  had  written  that 
the  cross  was  borne  by  Simon  of  Cyrene ;  and 
as  Mark  adds,  "  the  father  of  Alexander  and 
Rufus,"  we  can  scarcely  doubt  the  correctness 
of  his  assertion.  It  is  possible  that,  in  this 
case,  the  Fourth  Evangelist  altered  the  state- 
ment of  Mark,  because  he  thought  it  beneath 
the  divine  dignity  of  Jesus  that  He  should 
accept  the  aid  of  a  man  on  such  an  occasion. 
Or  it  may  be  that  at  the  start  Jesus  bore  His 

1  Wendt,  The  Gospel  according  to  St  John,  Eng.  trans., 
p.  254.  2  xix.  17. 


THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL  69 

own  cross ;  and  that  the  Evangelist,  knowing 
this,  desired  to  correct  the  current  tradition. 
In  all  such  conjectures  it  is  hard  to  say- 
when  we.  can  reach  certainty,  or  even  strong 
probability. 

Of  course  the  most  natural  view  would  be 
that  this  witness  who  repeated,  probably  in 
Ephesus,  the  events  of  the  life  of  Jesus  was 
the  Apostle  John,  the  son  of  Zebedee.  This 
is  the  readiest  way  of  accounting  for  the 
persistent  early  tradition  which  regarded  the 
Gospel  as  the  Gospel  according  to  John. 
And  it  seems  to  be  definitely  stated  in  the 
appendix  to  the  Gospel :  "  This  is  the  disciple 
who  bears  witness  of  these  things  and  wrote 
these  things."  This  -is  of  course  said  not  of 
John  by  name,  but  of  the  "  beloved  disciple." 
who  has  been  by  most  commentators,  and 
in  my  view  rightly,  taken  as  John  the  son 
of  Zebedee.  The  words  "  and  wrote  these 
things "  certainly  give  us  some  pause,  as  it 
would  seem  far  more  probable  that  the  source 
of  the  Apostolic  tradition  was  oral  rather  than 
written.  But  people  in  those  days  did  not  use 
their  words  with  the  pedantic  accuracy  to  which 
modern  scholars  are  accustomed.  Any  frag- 
mentary piece  of  writing  left  by  the  Apostle 
might  justify  the  vague  phrase  of  the  text. 

It   is   indeed   very  doubtful  whether  John 


70  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

the  fisherman  of  Galilee  would  have  had 
sufficient  literary  training  to  write  any  con- 
tinuous composition,  above  all  a  composition 
in  a  language  so  little  familiar  to  the  Galilean 
peasants  as  Greek.  But  if  he  did  leave  any 
writing  which  could  be  used  as  biographical 
matter,  it  would  probably  be  an  account  of 
the  trial  and  death  of  his  Master.  The  phrase 
"  who  wrote  these  things  "  is  immediately  in 
connection  with  the  details  of  the  Crucifixion, 
which  perhaps  John  alone  of  the  disciples 
witnessed.  The  account  of  the  last  days  is 
in  the  Gospel  so  very  much  more  ample  and 
detailed  than  any  other  part  of  the  biography, 
while  at  the  same  time  it  has  not  at  all  the 
air  of  mere  invention,  that  one  is  compelled 
to  think  that  the  Evangelist  regarded  this 
part  of  his  work  as  in  a  special  degree  founded 
upon  the  testimony  of  an  eye-witness.  But 
whether  he  was  merely  incorporating  details 
which  he  had  learned  orally  through  frequent 
repetition,  or  whether  he  was  using  a  written 
document,  we  cannot  doubt  that  he  would 
feel  justified  in  proceeding  with  perfect  free- 
dom. That  part  of  his  narrative  is  in  the 
same  style,  and  shows  the  same  tendencies  as 
the  rest.  However  much  of  actual  tradition 
it  may  include,  it  is  essentially  a  part  of  the 
new,  more  spiritual  Gospel. 


THE    EPHESIAN    GOSPEL  71 

It  seems  quite  incredible  that  if  the  Apostle 
John  were  the  actual  writer  of  the  Gospel,  he 
should  have  designated  himself  in  it  by  the 
phrase  "  the  disciple  whom  Jesus  loved."  But 
if  the  Gospel  were  written  by  a  follower  of 
his  who  held  him  in  high  esteem,  nothing 
could  be  more  natural  than  such  a  designation. 
Such  a  follower  would  remember  how  the 
Apostle  dwelt  lovingly  on  the  various 
occasions  on  which  his  Master  had  treated 
him  with  confidence  and  affection,  and  reverted 
gladly  to  such  incidents  again  and  again ; 
and  the  phrase  "  the  disciple  whom  Jesus 
loved "  would  naturally  form  itself  in  his 
mind.  Details  and  circumstances  not  exactly 
given  in  the  ordinary  tradition,  but  repeated 
by  the  Apostolic  teacher,  would  especially 
dwell  in  his  memory,  and  he  would  naturally 
incorporate  them  in  his  narrative. 

It  has  often  been  observed  that  there  appear 
traces  in  the  Gospel  of  a  rivalry  between  St 
Peter  and  the  Beloved  Disciple,  and  that  the 
Evangelist  is  on  the  side  of  the  latter.  At  the 
Last  Supper  the  Disciple  has  a  place  next  to 
Jesus  Himself,  and  Peter  can  only  ask  a  ques- 
tion of  the  Lord  through  him.  It  is  through 
the  influence  of  the  Disciple  that  Peter  is 
admitted  into  the  court  of  the  High  Priest. 
When  Peter  and  the  Disciple  ran  together  to 


72  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

the  sepulchre,  the  Disciple  arrived  first.  And 
whereas  Peter  denied  his  Lord,  the  Disciple 
was  standing  by  the  cross,  and  received  a 
charge  to  take  care  of  the  mother  of  Jesus. 
Some  critics  have  supposed  that  these  touches 
prove  that  St  John,  when  writing  the  Gospel, 
took  occasion  to  put  Peter  in  the  second  place. 
It  is  surely  a  far  more  satisfactory  view  to 
hold  that  the  depreciation  of  Peter  when  he 
comes  into  rivalry  with  the  Beloved  Disciple 
is  a  result  of  the  honest  love  and  partisanship 
of  one  of  the  followers  of  that  Disciple,  rather 
than  of  his  own  jealousy  or  self-assertion. 

The  objections  to  the  belief  that  we  have 
in  the  Fourth  Gospel  a  strain  belonging  to 
the  son  of  Zebedee  are  two.  They  are 
serious,  but  not,  as  I  think,  conclusive. 

One  is  that  several  good  authorities  have 
in  recent  works  maintained  that  John  the  son 
of  Zebedee  was  martyred,  like  his  brother 
James,  early  in  the  Christian  history,  and  that 
the  traditions  which  bring  him  to  Ephesus 
and  represent  him  as  living  to  an  advanced 
age  arose  out  of  a  confusion  between  him 
and  another  John — John  the  Elder  or 
Presbyter,  who  was  the  author  of  the  second 
and  third  of  the  Epistles  which  go  by  the 
name  of  John,  and  of  whom  we  find  traces 
in  the  tradition  of  Papias.     As   Dr  Latimer 


THE   EPHESIAN    GOSPEL  73 

Jackson  puts  it :  *  "  There  is  but  one  John 
of  Asia  Minor  to  be  reckoned  with.  Going 
down,  the  old  man  full  of  years,  to  his 
Ephesian  grave  in  peace,  he  was,  it  may  be 
conjectured,  that  enigmatical  but  real  person- 
age who  somehow  refuses  identification  with 
the  son  of  Zebedee,  the  'beloved  disciple.' 
As  for  the  Apostle  John,  it  is  within  the 
bounds  of  probability  that,  whatever  the 
locality  and  date,  he  died  a  martyr's  death." 
A  further  objection  is  that  the  Gospel  does 
not  in  tone  and  character  correspond  to  what 
we  learn  in  the  Synoptic  Gospels  about  the 
son  of  Zebedee.  Hot  and  fiery  in  temper, 
he  was  for  calling  down  fire  from  heaven  on 
the  village  of  the  Samaritans  which  would 
not  receive  his  Master ;  and  it  was  he  who 
forbade  the  man  who  cast  out  devils  in  the 
name  of  Jesus.  He  deeply  offended  the 
Apostles  by  allowing  his  mother  to  claim  for 
him  the  highest  place  of  honour  in  the  coming 
Kingdom.  Although  he  was  one  of  three 
disciples  admitted  to  the  closest  intimacy  of 
his  Master,  he  does  not  seem  to  have  shown 
the  power  to  fully  appreciate  His  spirit  and 
purposes.  These  facts  do  certainly  furnish  a 
very  strong,  perhaps  a   conclusive,  argument 

1  Proceedings  of  the  Society  of  Historical  Theology,  1912, 
p.  35. 


74  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

against  assigning  to  the  Apostle  the  writing 
of  the  Gospel.  But  they  are  not  at  all  valid 
against  such  an  association  with  the  writer  as 
I  have  suggested.  For  it  is  in  the  very  nature 
of  the  actual  author  of  the  Gospel,  whoever 
he  may  have  been,  to  transform  every  fact 
and  every  statement  with  which  he  came  in 
contact  by  the  power  of  a  sort  of  spiritual 
magnetism. 

The  arguments  for  the  death  of  the  Apostle 
by  martyrdom  do  not  appear  to  me  to  be  so 
strong  as  they  seem  to  Dr  Latimer  Jackson. 
But  I  think  that  the  question  of  the  Johns 
of  Ephesus  is  so  obscure  that  it  will  never  be 
finally  solved.  There  is  John  the  Apostle, 
whom  early  tradition  takes  to  Ephesus,  and 
whose  grave  was  shown  there.  There  is  John 
the  Prophet,  who  wrote  the  Apocalypse.  There 
is  John  the  Elder,  author  of  two  Epistles.  In 
my  opinion  we  have  much  reason  for  thinking 
that  the  Gospel  was  written  by  a  disciple  of 
John  the  Apostle. 

In  whatever  way  the  tangled  skein  be  un- 
wound, it  does  not  greatly  matter  to  the 
purpose  of  this  book.  I  may  fairly  confine 
myself  to  the  statement,  not  based  on  untrust- 
worthy traditions,  but  derived  from  a  study 
of  the  Gospel  itself,  that  the  writer  had 
in  his  mind  an  oral  tradition  of  the  life  of 


THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL  75 

Jesus  which  had  hitherto  flowed  apart  from 
the  ordinary  channels  of  evangelic  composition. 

But  1  have  yet  to  speak  of  the  second  and 
more  dominant  element  in  the  mind  of  the 
Evangelist.  To  such  a  nature  as  his,  though 
he  is  always  in  a  sense  striving  to  be  exact, 
facts  appear  in  so  changed  a  form  that  their 
mere  outward  and  physical  side  matters  but 
little.  St  Paul  speaks  of  looking  not  on  the 
things  which  are  seen,  but  on  the  things  which 
are  invisible.  But  the  Fourth  Evangelist 
carries  that  habit  of  mind  much  further  than 
even  St  Paul.  Every  event  for  him  is  trans- 
lated from  a  temporal  and  spacial  setting  into 
one  which  is  ideal  and  spiritual ;  it  has  a  mean- 
ing in  relation  to  the  great  purposes  of  God. 
And  this  higher  aspect  of  deeds  and  words  so 
overshadows  their  mere  physical  side  that  the 
latter  almost  ceases  to  exist.  "  It  is  the  spirit 
that  giveth  life,"  he  writes  ;  "  the  flesh  profiteth 
nothing."  These  words  might  well  be  printed 
at  the  head  of  the  Gospel,  as  the  text  on  which 
all  the  rest  is  but  commentary.  I  shall  have 
continually  in  the  present  work  to  recur  to 
them. 

This  manner  of  looking  at  tradition  is  quite 
characteristic  of  the  mentality  of  the  sages  of 
Alexandria  and  other  Hellenistic  centres.  It 
is  best  illustrated  for  us  in  the  commentaries 


76  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

of  Origen,  which  set  forth,  with  an  abundance 
of  instances,1  how  the  Scriptures,  under  which 
name  he  includes  not  only  the  Hebrew  Scrip- 
tures but  the  Gospels  and  the  Pauline  Epistles, 
have  ordinarily  not  only  a  material  or  literal, 
but  also  an  inner  or  spiritual  meaning.  And 
of  these  the  spiritual  meaning  is  the  more  im- 
portant and  to  be  preferred  when  there  is  a 
clashing  between  them.  He  is  even  ready  to 
allow  that  some  events  narrated  in  Scripture 
did  not  as  a  matter  of  fact  take  place,  but  are 
to  be  regarded  as  symbolic  only. 

Almost  the  only  case  in  which  the  authority 
of  the  Apostolic  teacher  is  expressly  cited  is 
when  the  Evangelist  records  that  when  the 
soldiers  after  the  Crucifixion  came  to  Jesus  and 
saw  that  he  was  dead  already,  they  contented 
themselves  with  thrusting  a  spear  into  his  side, 
"  and  straightway  there  came  out  blood  and 
water.  And  he  that  hath  seen  hath  borne 
witness,  and  his  witness  is  true."  This  state- 
ment has  greatly  perplexed  the  literalists  ;  for 
when  a  dead  body  is  pierced,  blood  mixed  with 
water  does  not  come  out,  unless  indeed  there 
be  some  local  disorder,  some  blister  on  the 
surface  or  cyst  within,  which  might  hold  water. 
But  the  statement  can  scarcely  be  pressed  as 
evidence  which  would  satisfy  a  physician.     It 

1  De  Prhicipiis,  iv.  chaps,  xi.-xvi. 


THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL  77 

is  sufficient  to  prove  that  in  the  eyes  of  the 
witness  standing  by  there  was  some  appear- 
ance which  seemed  to  resemble  blood  mixed 
with  water.  But  the  Evangelist  looks  on  the 
testimony  with  very  different  eyes.  To  him  it 
is  a  mere  parable,  a  symbol  to  show  that  the 
death  on  the  cross  was  a  sacrifice  of  cleansing 
in  both  the  ways  in  which  such  cleansing  took 
place  according  to  the  religious  views  of  the 
time.  It  was  by  the  water  of  baptism  or 
sprinkling,  and  by  the  blood  of  animal  sacri- 
fices, that  men  were  cleansed  from  impurity, 
and  made  fit  to  approach  the  Divine  presence. 
The  Evangelist  delights  in  the  fact  and  em- 
phasises the  testimony  for  it,  because  it  has  a 
high  significance  and  .shows  how  the  death  on 
the  cross  is  a  part  of  the  eternal  purpose  of 
God  for  the  salvation  of  men. 

Another  example  may  be  taken  of  a  some- 
what different  kind,  in  which  the  Evangelist 
still  more  clearly  shows  the  working  of  his 
mind.  The  high  priest  Caiaphas  "  was  he 
who  gave  counsel  to  the  Jews  that  one  man 
should  die  for  the  people."1  And  the  Evan- 
gelist comments  on  this  counsel :  "  This  he  said, 
not  of  himself;  but  being  high  priest  that 
year,  he  prophesied  that  Jesus  should  die  for 
the  nation,  and  not  for  the  nation  only,  but 

1   John  xviii.  14;  compare  xi.  50. 


78  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

that  he  might  also  gather  together  into  one 
the  children  of  God  that  are  scattered  abroad." 
The  obvious  fact  was  the  callous  utilitarianism 
of  the  high  priest,  who,  careless  of  justice,  was 
ready  to  destroy  a  reformer  who  brought  the 
nation  into  peril.  But  the  Evangelist  sees 
beneath  the  words  of  unprincipled  expedi- 
ency the  utterance  of  a  magnificent  spiritual 
prophecy,  which  God  spoke  by  the  mouth  of 
a  high  priest,  however  unworthy. 

St  Paul  and  the  Fourth  Evangelist  have  in 
the  main  the  same  conception  of  Christianity. 
They  are  both  inspired  by  the  same  great 
ideas.  St  Paul  comes  first,  and  opens  the 
way ;  and  it  is  obvious  that  without  his 
preaching  and  influence  the  Fourth  Gospel 
would  not  have  been  written.  It  is  the 
result,  setting  aside  the  special  divine  inspira- 
tion of  the  writer,  of  the  working  of  the 
Pauline  teaching  in  the  rich  religious  soil  of 
Ephesus.  But  though  the  informing  ideas  in 
Pauline  Epistles  and  Johannine  Gospel  are 
much  the  same,  yet  their  manifestation  in  the 
two  is  astonishingly  different.  We  cannot 
hope  wholly  to  explain  that  difference,  since 
it  is  impossible  ever  fully  to  explain  the  path 
of  divine  inspiration.  "  The  wind  bloweth 
where  it  listeth  :  so  is  everyone  that  is  born 
of  the  Spirit."     But  it  is  our  duty  to  explain 


THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL  79 

and  to  understand  it  as  far  as  we  can.  We 
have  duties  to  history,  as  well  as  duties  to 
religion. 

In  a  previous  work1  I  have  tried  to  show 
that  the  divine  ideas  working  in  the  world 
may  alternatively  find  expression  in  history 
marked  with  a  strong  ethical  tinge,  and  in 
doctrine.  In  the  Pauline  Epistles,  whicli  are 
mainly  doctrinal,  there  is  a  certain  admixture 
of  what  may  be  called  history.  The  writer 
has  notions  as  to  the  character  of  Adam's  fall, 
the  calling  of  Abraham,  and  the  like.  But  it 
is  so  filled  with,  and  transposed  by,  doctrine 
that  historic  fact,  or  fact  at  the  time  supposed 
to  be  historic,  is  overlaid  and  almost  lost. 
The  writer  of  Hebrews  is  almost  entirely 
doctrinal,  but  he  brings  in  a  touch  of  history 
in  quoting  the  meeting  of  Abraham  and 
Melchizedek.  In  the  Fourth  Gospel,  history 
takes  a  very  different  place.  The  Gospel  is 
professedly  historical ;  and  is,  as  I  believe,  in 
parts  full  of  genuine  historic  tradition.  But 
in  the  amalgamation  of  history  and  doctrine 
the  writer  goes  far  beyond  St  Paul  and  the 
writer  of  Hebrews. 

The  Evangelist  felt  that  the  life  lived  on 
earth  by  Jesus  was  a  real  life,  conditioned  not 
only  by  time  and  space,  but  by  real  humanity. 

1  Exploratio  Evangelica,  chaps,  ix.  x. 


80  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

His  body  was  no  illusion,  but  a  solid  fact. 
The  Evangelist  not  only  ascribes  humanity 
to  the  Divine  Word,  but  even  says,  "  The  word 
was  made  flesh,"  the  term  flesh  indicating  the 
complete  materiality  of  the  body  of  Jesus. 
He  was  born  of  human  parents  ;  for  the  story 
of  the  virgin  birth,  already  current  in  the 
Church,  is  not  repeated  by  the  Evangelist, 
nor  alluded  to  by  him.  The  Evangelist  had 
a  loftier  doctrine  of  the  Incarnation.  Jesus, 
he  knew,  had  suffered  from  weariness  and 
thirst ;  he  had  wept  for  sorrow,  and  when  his 
side  was  pierced  blood  had  flowed  from  it. 

We  come  here  on  one  side,  and  a  very 
important  side,  of  the  Evangelist's  mind  and 
teaching.  Spiritual  as  he  was,  there  was  in 
him  also  a  certain  vein  of  materialism,  as  there 
must  be  in  every  man  who  is  fitted  for  life  on 
this  world  of  ours.  When  we  come  to  speak 
of  the  Christian  sacraments,  we  shall  find  that 
he  regarded  them  on  their  literal  and  ritual 
side  as  of  great  importance.  There  can  be 
little  doubt  as  to  the  current  which  drove  the 
Evangelist  in  a  direction  with  which  he  had 
little  real  sympathy.  Already  Gnostic  notions, 
such  as  those  of  Cerinthus,  were  a  danger  to 
the  Church.  There  seemed  a  possibility  that 
those  who  carried  further  the  Pauline  line  of 
the  spirit  being  everything  and  the  flesh  wholly 


THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL  81 

unprofitable  might  not  only  dispense  with  the 
sacraments  of  Christianity,  but  even  regard 
the  life  of  the  Founder  as  a  matter  of  indiffer- 
ence. We  know  that  before  long  there  arose 
the  Docetic  tendency  to  maintain  that  the  life 
of  Jesus  on  earth  was  a  mere  apparition  or 
delusion  ;  that  it  was  only  a  simulacrum  which 
suffered  on  the  cross.  They  denied  that  the 
Word  of  God  could  really  be  human,  though 
for  a  time  He  might  inhabit  a  human  body. 
Against  the  rise  of  this  tendency  even  St  Paul, 
who  was  in  a  sense  its  author,  protested.  And 
it  is  infinitely  creditable  to  the  wisdom  of  the 
Fourth  Evangelist — I  should  prefer  to  say  a 
proof  of  the  reality  of  his  divine  inspiration — 
that  he  set  himself  rigidly  against  the  Gnostic 
aberrations.  He  saw  the  danger,  which  was  a 
real  danger,  that  Christianity  might  be  emptied 
of  positive  contents,  and  become  a  mere  form 
of  theosophic  speculation.  Like  all  great 
teachers  of  men,  he  was  able  to  draw  the  line 
against  the  excess  of  his  own  tendencies. 
Some  writers  have  said  that  Socrates,  who 
spent  his  life  in  warring  against  the  Sophists, 
was  the  greatest  of  the  Sophists.  And  some 
have  said  that  the  Fourth  Evangelist,  who 
protested  against  Gnosticism,  was  the  greatest 
of   Gnostic   thinkers.      That   is    a   superficial 

view :   the  wise  mean  is  always  regarded  by 

6 


82  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

each  extreme  as  on  the  side  of  the  other. 
The  Evangelist  tried  to  hold  the  scales  even. 
He  thought,  however,  that  material  and  visible 
conditions  had  blinded  the  eyes  of  the  disciples 
to  the  manifestations  of  the  spirit  which 
showed  through  corporeal  conditions.  Hidden 
under  the  veil  of  the  flesh  was  no  human  spirit, 
but  the  eternal  Word  of  God,  who  had  been 
working  in  the  world  since  it  was  formed  from 
chaos,  and  was  now  revealed  in  form  as  a  man, 
but  with  wisdom  and  powers  more  than 
human. 

According  to  St  Paul,  the  Spirit  who  dwelt 
in  the  earthly  Jesus  had  dwelt  with  the  Divine 
Father  before  the  world  was  made,  and  after 
the  death  on  the  cross  returned  to  sit  on  the 
right  hand  of  God,  while  at  the  same  time  He 
guided  and  inspired  the  Church.  But  St  Paul 
had  dwelt  on  the  suffering,  the  humiliation, 
and  the  death  of  Jesus  Christ,  not  on  His  life. 
He  held  that  in  coming  to  earth  He  had 
emptied  Himself  of  divine  prerogative,  and 
that  His  divine  nature  had,  as  it  were,  for  a 
time  suffered  eclipse.  But  the  Evangelist 
believed  that,  in  all  the  steps  of  that  life,  those 
who  had  spiritual  discernment  might  see  the 
indwelling  Word,  that  even  on  earth  He 
showed  a  glory  as  of  the  only-begotten  Son  of 
the  Father,  which  shone  out  in  works  such  as 


THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL  83 

no  other  man  did,  and  in  words  which  no  other 
could  speak. 

Some  critics  have  held  that,  filled  with  such 
purposes, .  the  Evangelist  freely  composed  a 
life  of  his  Lord,  making  occasions  in  which  he 
could  work  in  the  higher  spiritual  teaching 
with  which  he  was  imbued.  But  I  regard 
such  a  view  as  not  merely  in  itself  unsatis- 
factory, but  as  contrary  to  the  evidence.  It 
seems  quite  clear  that  he  was  conscious  of 
possessing  knowledge  as  to  the  biography  of 
Jesus,  which  previous  writers  did  not  possess. 
He  often  clearly  intends  to  correct  current 
historic  statements.  Of  the  last  days  before 
Calvary  he  gives  a  minute  and  detailed  history, 
which  seems  to  many-  unprejudiced  critics  to 
be  more  precise  and  accurate  in  its  sequence 
of  events  than  the  account  in  other  evangelists. 
He  brings  in  many  statements  as  to  geographic 
and  personal  fact  which  appear  to  be  exact. 
So  far  as  events  go,  he  tries  not  to  write  a 
romance,  but  to  narrate  a  life.  That  he  is 
careless  as  to  the  succession  of  events  is  but 
natural  to  so  highly  idealist  a  writer,  writing 
under  conditions  quite  different  from  those  of 
the  modern  world. 

It  appears  to  be  quite  clear  that  he  regards 
himself  as  commissioned  to  give  to  the  Church 
the  testimony  of  an  eye-witness  of  the  events 


84  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

which  he  records.  To  take  a  single  instance  : 
he  says  that  when  the  beloved  disciple,  run- 
ning with  Peter,  came  to  the  tomb,  he  did  not 
content  himself  with  looking  in  from  outside, 
but  "  entered  into  the  tomb  ;  and  he  beholdeth 
the  lineix  cloths  lying,  and  the  napkin  which 
was  upon  His  (Jesus')  head,  not  lying  with 
the  cloths,  but  rolled  up  in  a  place  by  itself." 
This  detail  must  either  be  an  invention,  for 
which  some  origin  in  symbolism  may  be  sug- 
gested, or  a  piece  of  testimony  handed  down 
by  a  witness.  I  have  no  doubt  that  it  is  the 
latter ;  and  in  this  and  other  cases  it  is  made 
clear  that  the  witness  on  whom  the  Evangelist 
relies  is  the  beloved  disciple,  who,  as  I  have 
already  observed,  must  be  the  Apostle  John. 
It  seems  perfectly  clear,  then,  that  the  Evan- 
gelist had  been  an  attentive  and  admiring 
hearer  either  of  John  the  son  of  Zebedee,  or 
of  one  of  his  immediate  disciples  and  followers. 
It  is,  however,  not  legitimate  to  leap,  as  so 
many  writers  do,  from  this  conclusion  to  the 
conviction  that  the  narrative  in  the  Fourth 
Gospel,  reproducing  the  testimony  of  a  deeply 
interested  eye-witness,  is  of  equal  or  superior 
value  as  regards  historic  fact  to  the  Gospel 
of  Mark,  which  is  on  good  grounds  regarded 
as  giving  a  summary  of  the  preaching  of  St 
Peter.     People  who   proceed    thus    can   have 


THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL  85 

no  notion  how  far,  to  such  a  writer  as  our 
Evangelist,  idea  is  more  important  than  his- 
torical fact,  and  edification  than  intellectual  „• 
instruction.  St  Luke,  writing  as  a  Greek, 
does  give  it  as  his  purpose  that  his  readers 
may  know  facts,  although  his  notion  of  history 
is  very  different  from  that  of  modern  days. 
But  the  Fourth  Evangelist  writes :  "  These 
things  are  written  that  ye  may  believe  that 
Jesus  is  the  Christ  the  Son  of  God  ;  and  that, 
believing,  ye  may  have  life  in  His  name."  He 
writes  primarily  to  build  up  the  Church  of 
Ephesus,  and  only  secondarily  to  correct  some 
of  the  mistaken  views  of  his  predecessors.  The 
element  of  Christian  experience  tells  far  more  ' 
in  his  writings  than  the  element  of  tradition. 
In  his  Epistle  he  repeats  this  notice : 1  "  The 
anointing  which  ye  received  of  Him  abideth 
in  you,  and  ye  need  not  that  anyone  should 
teach  you."  It  was  the  conscience  of  the 
Church  which  was  the  test  of  all  truth,  even 
truth  in  regard  to  the  life  of  the  Founder 
of  Christianity.  The  scientific  historian,  of 
course,  cannot  take  this  view.  But  so  modern 
a  writer  as  Dr  Dale  of  Birmingham  accepts 
it  in  his  very  suggestive  work,  The  Living 
Christ.  This  writer  thinks  that  converse  with 
the  exalted  Christ  will  enable  a  Christian  to 

1   \  Epistle  ii.  27. 


86  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

judge  of  the  historicity  of  events  recorded  by 
the  Evangelists.  From  the  point  of  view  of 
historic  science  this  of  course  could  not  be 
allowed.  But  it  is  a  notion  far  more  excusable 
in  the  first  century  than  in  the  nineteenth. 

It  is  all  but  impossible  that  one  who  had 
been  an  actual  companion  of  Jesus  should 
have  had  all  his  recollections  so  transmuted  in 
course  of  time  that  the  Jesus  reflected  in  the 
Synoptic  Gospels  should  have  become  trans- 
formed into  the  Jesus  of  the  Fourth  Gospel. 
I  say  "  all  but  impossible,"  not  "  impossible," 
because  the  early  history  of  Christianity  is  so 
full  of  the  utterly  unexpected,  of  events  which 
a  historian  finds  it  very  difficult  to  account  for, 
that  one  can  scarcely  venture  to  say  what  is 
and  what  is  not  impossible.  The  inspiration 
of  the  Church  worked  in  ways  so  strange  that 
we  can  only  follow  it  with  open  minds  and 
bated  breath.  But  when  the  choice  lies  be- 
tween two  views,  one  of  which  is  in  the  highest 
degree  unnatural  and  unlikely,  and  the  other 
by  no  means  outside  our  experience  and  the 
bounds  of  probability,  we  are  bound  to  accept 
the  latter. 

By  far  the  most  probable  and  reasonable 
view  is  that  the  Fourth  Evangelist,  a  man  of 
philosophic  mind  and  profound  genius,  had 
been  as  a  young  man  converted  by  the  preach- 


THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL  87 

ing  of  St  Paul,  which  teaching  he  never  did 
more  than  modify,  never  gave  up.  Afterwards 
coming  under  the  strong  influence  of  St  John 
or  one  of  his  immediate  followers,  he  heard 
many  details  of  the  life  of  Jesus,  listening  with 
ears  still  full  of  the  Pauline  teaching,  and  a 
heart  full  of  the  spiritual  presence  of  the  Christ 
of  the  Church.  The  simple  narrative  of  the 
eye-witness  took  in  his  mind  a  new  and  exalted 
character.  He  was  convinced  that  the  A  postles, 
even  the  most  favoured  of  them,  did  not  fully 
comprehend  the  life  which  was  unrolled  before 
them,  and  accepted  the  teaching  only  as  it  lay 
on  the  surface,  not  understanding  the  depths 
which  lay  beneath.  Often  between  the  words  of 
his  teacher  he  would  see  an  opening  into  great 
spiritual  vistas.  At  the  same  time,  he  clearly 
had  a  deep  love  and  profound  admiration  for 
the  son  of  Zebedee :  he  realised  that  the  rela- 
tion in  which  he  had  stood  to  his  Master  con- 
secrated him  for  ever.  Only,  his  eyes  had  been 
dazzled  by  seeing :  those  who  had  not  seen, 
like  St  Paul  and  himself,  were  in  a  sense  more 
blessed  ;  because  to  the  vision  of  faith  only, 
and  not  to  the  eyes  of  the  body,  could  the  true 
majesty  of  Jesus  Christ  become  clear. 

It  has  further  been  suggested  that  in  early 
life  the  Evangelist  may  have  belonged  to  the 
Society  founded  by  John  the    Baptist.     This 


88  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

theory  has  so  much  in  its  favour  that  it  is 
almost  more  than  a  theory.  We  know  that 
at  Ephesus,  in  the  time  of  St  Paul,  there  were 
followers  of  the  Baptist.  Mr  Scott x  has  pointed 
out  that  in  the  Clementine  Recognitions  (pro- 
bably of  the  third  century)  mention  is  made  of 
some  of  the  followers  of  the  Baptist  who  main- 
tained their  master  to  be  the  Christ :  this  proves 
that  the  sect  was  not  early  merged  in  Chris- 
tianity. The  account  of  the  Baptist  at  the 
beginning  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  is  very  appre- 
ciative ;  but  emphasis  is  laid  on  his  position  as 
a  mere  herald,  not  as  "he  that  should  come." 
And  further,  the  rather  remarkable  emphasis 
laid  on  the  rite  of  Baptism  by  the  Evangelist 
may  be  held  to  show  that  belief  in  the  rite  had 
at  one  time  taken  an  important  place  in  his 
scheme  of  religion.  All  this  would  be  most 
natural  in  one  who  passed  from  the  religion  of 
the  Baptist  to  that  of  St  Paul. 

The  Evangelist  makes  it  quite  clear  that  he 
prefers  the  faith  which  sees  the  invisible  to  the 
mere  bodily  seeing.  Indeed,  he  expresses  this 
clearly  in  the  words  addressed  to  Thomas : 
"  Because  thou  hast  seen  thou  hast  believed : 
blessed  are  they  that  have  not  seen,  and  yet 
have  believed." 

These  words  remind  us  of  the  very  similar 

1    The  Fourth  Gospel,  p.  80. 


THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL  89 

utterance  of  St  Paul :  "  We  look  not  at  the 
things  which  are  seen,  but  at  the  things  which 
are  not  seen  :  for  the  things  which  are  seen  are 
temporal,  but  the  things  which  are  not  seen 
are  eternal."  But  in  fact  this  way  of  thinking 
goes  back  far  beyond  St  Paul.  These  two 
great  lights  of  the  Church  baptised  into  Chris- 
tianity a  mode  of  regarding  things  which  can 
be  felt  and  seen — the  mystic  way,  which  has 
been  prevalent  as  far  back  as  history  will  take 
us  in  India  and  other  Asiatic  countries,  and 
which  was  brought  into  Greek  philosophy  by 
the  genius  of  Plato. 

To  the  sage  of  India,  now  and  in  the  past, 
sight  has  been  a  mere  source  of  illusion :  his 
great  object,  pursued  .through  fasting  and  self- 
denial,  through  meditation  and  prayer,  is  to 
pass  beyond  the  material  and  the  sensible,  and 
to  dwell  in  the  world  of  pure  thought  or  pure 
being.  Pleasure  and  pain,  earthly  enjoyments 
and  ambitions  are  merely  illusion,  impediments 
which  hinder  men  from  approach  to  the  Divine  : 
to  rise  beyond  them,  to  annihilate  them,  is  the 
end  of  his  asceticism.  In  coming  westward, 
among  people  of  more  practical  and  energetic 
temper,  this  tendency  has  been  greatly  modi- 
fied. But  as  regards  thought  and  knowledge 
it  is  fairly  embodied  in  the  system  of  Plato. 
For  Plato  taught  that  all  visible  and  material 


90  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

things  are  but  shows  and  images,  reflections 
in  the  world  of  sense  and  time  of  the  divine 
ideas,  which  alone  have  true  being.  The  well- 
known  simile  of  the  Republic  which  compares 
mankind  to  prisoners  chained  in  the  depths  of 
a  cave,  and  seeing  only  the  shadows  of  things 
which  pass  before  them,  but  supposing  those 
shadows  to  be  realities,  became  a  common- 
place in  the  schools  which  followed.  We  see 
reflections  of  the  Platonic  ideality  not  only 
in  the  works  of  the  philosophers,  but  in  the 
epitaphs  of  tombs,  the  rise  of  mystic  cults,  the 
gradual  dissolution  of  the  simple  naturalist 
religion  of  Homer  and  Pindar. 

It  must  be  confessed  that  the  picture  drawn 
by  the  Evangelist  is  as  a  whole  a  non-natural 
one.  The  greatest  contrast  exists  between  the 
Jesus  of  the  Synoptists,  who  is  exquisitely  and 
touchingly  human,  and  the  figure  who  says, 
"  I  am  the  light  of  the  world,  the  door  of 
the  sheepfold,  the  true  vine,"  "  Ye  are  from 
beneath,  1  am  from  above,"  and  so  on.  We 
see  that  such  a  figure  could  not  historically 
have  existed.  This  figure  is  halfway  to  the 
Gnostic  Jesus  whose  life  on  earth  was  that  of 
a  phantasm.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  we  must 
consider  two  facts.  In  the  first  place,  we  must 
allow  that  in  his  procedure  there  was  nothing 
in  disaccord  with  the  notion  of  historic  truth 


THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL  91 

prevalent  at  the  time.  And,  in  the  second 
place,  we  must  discern  of  what  infinite  value 
the  spiritual  teaching  of  the  Evangelist  has  been 
to  the  Church  in  every  age  of  her  history.  In 
rewriting  the  life  of  the  Saviour  in  the  light  of 
His  exaltation,  he  has  shown  that  Divine  in- 
spiration of  which  the  clearest  indication  is  the 
adaptation  of  the  words  of  a  prophet  to  the 
promotion  of  the  good  of  generations  to  come. 


THE  WRITERS  IDEA  OF 
BIOGRAPHY 

It  is  very  hard  for  a  modern  mind,  and  especi- 
ally for  those  unversed  in  Greek  and  Roman 
literature,  to  understand  how  the  ancient  world 
regarded  history  and  biography.  With  us,  if 
an  author  writes  a  professedly  historic  work, 
or  a  biography,  he  is  expected  to  adhere  closely 
to  document  and  evidence.  If  he  writes  a 
historic  romance,  he  may  invent  to  his  heart's 
content,  but  no  one  would  think  of  taking  his 
book  as  a  serious  historic  document.  Either 
he  professes  to  narrate  the  facts,  or  he  does 
not,  but,  if  he  does,  any  kind  of  deliberate 
invention  is  remorselessly  condemned.  In  the 
Hellenistic  world  this  clear  line  of  distinction 
did  not  exist. 

The  change  of  view  between  ancient  and 
modern  literature  is  especially  noteworthy  in 
the  way  in  which  speeches  are  inserted.     No 

92 


THE    WRITER'S   IDEA    OF   BIOGRAPHY     93 

modern  biographer  would  think  of  inserting  a 
speech  and  attributing  it  to  his  hero,  unless  he 
had  the  authority  of  some  written  or  printed 
report  of  that  speech.  The  custom  of  ancient 
biographers  was  quite  different.  It  was  quite 
a  recognised  and  legitimate  thing  to  compose 
a  speech,  and  put  it  in  the  mouth  of  the  hero, 
if  it  was  convenient  in  that  way  to  give  the 
outlines  of  a  situation,  or  to  express  the  views 
which  the  biographer  supposed  his  subject  to 
entertain.  Of  course,  if  he  was  inserting  a 
speech  made  in  his  own  hearing,  he  would 
naturally  repeat  such  points  of  it  as  had  struck 
him.  But  he  would  see  no  possible  objection 
to  omitting  any  parts  which  he  regarded  as 
inappropriate,  or,  on  the  other  hand,  to  adding 
any  words  of  his  own  which  made  the  dis- 
course more  telling.  If  he  had  not  heard  the 
speech,  he  might  make  inquiries  of  those  who 
had  been  present,  or  again,  he  might  not ;  and, 
in  any  case,  if  he  was  satisfied  that  he  had 
produced  something  appropriate  to  the  occa- 
sion and  characteristic  of  the  person  who 
spoke,  his  conscience  would  be  at  rest.  I 
cannot  here  give  examples,  or  go  into  details  ; 
but  the  realisation  of  the  change  of  view 
which  I  have  mentioned  is  a  sort  of  pons  asin- 
orum  over  which  everyone  who  wishes  to 
attain  any  sound   knowledge    of  the   ancient 


94  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

world  must  pass — or   else   fall   through   into 
the  gulf. 

It  will,  however,  naturally  occur  to  the 
reader  that  there  is  danger  in  passing  from  the 
literary  customs  of  historians  like  Tacitus  and 
Plutarch  to  the  early  biographers  of  Christi- 
anity. Tacitus  was  making  a  literary  history, 
and  none  of  the  Emperors  of  whom  he  writes 
was  his  master  and  hero.  The  Evangelist  was 
recording  the  deeds  and  the  words  of  one 
whom  he  regarded  as  the  Saviour,  to  whom 
he  looked  up  as  divine,  as  the  Son  of  God,  and 
the  light  of  the  world.  How  would  he  dare 
to  ascribe  to  him  words  or  works  for  which 
there  was  not  the  clearest  authority  ?  1  am 
anxious  to  give  to  this  objection  as  much 
weight  as  I  possibly  can ;  and,  therefore,  I 
will  say  the  most  I  can  in  its  favour.  "  The 
words  which  I  have  spoken  unto  you,"  says 
Jesus  in  the  Fourth  Gospel,  "  they  are  spirit 
and  they  are  life."  Would  any  biographer,  not 
insane,  put  forth  words  of  his  own  composition 
as  spirit  and  life  ?  In  the  Jewish  Talmud  the 
greatest  care  is  shown  in  the  repetition  of  the 
sayings  of  great  Rabbis  :  how  much  more  care 
would  the  Evangelists  show  in  the  preserva- 
tion of  the  very  words  of  Him  who  spoke  as 
never  man  spoke.  Moreover,  it  will  be  said, 
if  the  Fourth  Evangelist  composed  speeches 


THE   WRITER'S   IDEA   OF   BIOGRAPHY     95 

for  his  Master,  why  should  not  the  others  have 
done  the  same,  so  that  we  have  no  speeches  of 
Jesus  which  can  be  shown  to  be  indubitably 
authentic  ?  Yet  the  picture  of  the  Master  in 
the  Synoptic  Gospels  is  far  too  vivid  and  too 
original  to  be  a  mere  creation  of  the  disciples. 
The  argument  is  strong,  and  I  should  be 
glad,  were  it  possible,  to  regard  it  as  con- 
clusive. But  it  is  overthrown,  not  by  reason- 
ing, but  by  clear  and  undoubted  fact.  We 
have  three  Synoptic  Gospels  ;  and  all  critics 
are  agreed  that  Matthew  and  Luke  had  the 
written  text  of  Mark,  or  of  a  document  which 
lies  behind  Mark,  before  them,  which  they  used 
as  a  basis.  Did  they  then  regard  the  words 
which  came  to  them  with  written,  and  prob- 
ably with  Apostolic  authority,  as  too  sacred 
to  be  altered  ?  Everyone  knows  that  they  did 
not.  We  can  place  a  diatessaron  before  us, 
and  study  at  leisure  the  way  in  which  they 
modified  the  text  before  them.  Did  they 
venture  to  do  so  because  they  were  in  posses- 
sion of  what  they  regarded  as  a  better  tradition 
of  the  exact  words  of  the  Master  ?  Perhaps 
this  may  be  the  case  in  some  instances.  But 
there  cannot  be  any  doubt  whatever,  in  the 
mind  of  anyone  who  considers  the  evidence, 
that  the  reason  for  their  alterations  was  in 
many   cases    subjective.      They   thought   the 


96  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

sayings  reported  in  Mark  inconsistent  with 
some  quality  which  they  thought  inherent  in 
their  Master,  and  altered  them  to  bring  them 
nearer  to  what  they  considered  it  fitting  that 
he  should  say.  Luke  often  alters  the  text  of 
Mark  to  turn  it  into  better  and  more  literary 
Greek :  Matthew  more  often  in  the  interests 
of  what  he  considers  a  higher  truth. 

The  nearest  we  can  approach,  from  the 
strictly  historic  point  of  view,  to  the  actual 
facts  of  the  life  of  Jesus  is  given  us  in  the 
Gospel  of  Mark.  The  nearest  we  can  approach 
to  His  teaching  is  given  us  in  the  document 
now  called  Q,  which  is  much  the  same  as  that 
formerly  called  the  Logia,  a  document  which 
lies  behind  the  sayings  reported  in  Matthew 
and  Luke.  Mark  we  cannot  very  effectually 
criticise,  as  we  have  no  other  biography  of 
equal  value  to  set  beside  it.  But  critics  now 
generally  recognise  that,  for  all  its  apparent 
simplicity,  and  its  inestimable  historic  value,  it 
is  really,  as  Dr  Westcott  says,  the  result  rather 
than  the  foundation  of  the  Apostolic  teaching. 
There  is  worked  into  it  a  great  deal  of  theory : 
it  is  written  primarily  for  the  edification  rather 
than  for  the  information  of  the  Church.  As 
to  Q,  it  cannot  be  with  any  certainty  re- 
constituted, for  the  critics  all  differ  as  to  its 
contents.     But  if  we  take  a  few  well-known 


THE   WRITER'S   IDEA    OF   BIOGRAPHY     97 

passages,  such  as  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount 
or  the  Lord's  Prayer,  and  compare  the  versions 
of  them  which  we  find  in  Matthew  and  Luke 
respectively,  we  shall  see  how  very  variously 
this  primitive  document  is  repeated  or  re- 
presented in  our  Gospels.  Matthew  and 
Luke  had  very  different  tendencies  of  mind. 
Matthew,  as  a  pious  Jew,  wrote  for  Jews, 
and  he  requires,  above  all  things,  a  conformity 
between  the  life  of  his  Master  and  the 
prophecies  of  the  great  prophets  of  Israel. 
Luke  wrote  rather  for  the  Jews  of  the  Disper- 
sion and  the  Gentile  converts ;  but  his  great 
sympathy  for  the  weak,  the  fallen,  the  poor, 
and  especially  for  women,  leads  him  to  lay 
most  stress  on  the  humanitarian  side  of  the 
Master's  teaching,  while  Matthew  dwells  more 
on  its  aspect  of  lofty  spirituality. 

To  us  moderns  it  seems  almost  miraculous 
that  in  a  place  so  far  from  literary  influences 
as  Palestine  there  should  be  produced  works  of 
such  admirable  beauty  as  the  First  and  Third 
Gospels.  It  could  only  be  possible  through 
the  influence  of  an  unique  personality  living 
on  earth,  and  the  continued  working  of  Divine 
inspiration  after  the  death  of  that  personality. 
And  if  those  who  are  accustomed  to  take  the 
Synoptic  Gospels  as  literal  history  are  shocked 
at  the  notion  that  the  subjective  tendencies  of 


98  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

the  writers  have  a  great  part  in  them,  that  the 
light  which  passes  through  them  is  not  white, 
but  coloured  as  by  "  a  dome  of  many  coloured 
glass,"  that  feeling  will  pass  on  further  reflec- 
tion. If  we  had  an  exact  and  infallible  record 
of  the  words  and  deeds  of  the  Founder,  or 
even  such  a  history  of  them  as  a  Polybius  or 
an  Arrian  might  have  written,  we  should  be 
forever  bound  by  the  tyranny  of  authority, 
and  Christian  freedom  and  character  would 
have  no  chance  of  developing.  We  should 
have  been  in  a  position  similar  to  that  of  the 
Mohammedans,  to  whom  the  authentic  writings 
of  their  Prophet  supply  a  law  which  may 
not  be  altered,  so  that  all  progress  becomes 
identified  with  heresy.  As  it  is,  the  search 
into  the  Christian  origins  has  become  a  vast 
branch  of  historic  research,  requiring  as 
complete  devotion  and  as  complicated  investi- 
gations as  do  any  of  the  physical  sciences. 
And,  meantime,  ordinary  Christians,  free  from 
the  trammels  of  literalism,  may  read  into  the 
Gospels  the  facts  of  their  own  spiritual 
experience,  drawing  their  life  from  them  as 
plants  draw  life  from  the  moist  soil,  by 
transmuting  the  bare  fact  into  something 
suited  to  their  own  growth  in  religion. 

The   Fourth    Evangelist   was    not   satisfied 
witli  the  three  Gospels,  all  of  which  he  may 


THE   WRITER'S   IDEA   OF   BIOGRAPHY     99 

have  known.  In  his  time  the  sources  of 
inspiration  were  still  freely  flowing,  and  he  did 
not  think  that  the  three  channels  already  cut 
were  sufficient  to  convey  it.  There  was  an 
overflow,  a  side  of  the  life  of  the  Church 
which  had  indeed  found  expression  in  the 
Epistles  of  St  Paul,  but  which  was  not 
connected  closely  enough  with  the  earthly 
life  of  Jesus.  St  Paul  had  said  little  as  to 
that  life ;  the  intensity  of  his  conviction  of 
a  personal  inspiration  had  filled  him,  and  his 
genius  moved  rather  in  the  two  directions  of 
missionary  enterprise  and  ethical  instruction. 
There  was  a  danger  that  the  recorded  life  of 
Jesus,  and  the  Pauline  enthusiasm  for  the 
living  Christ,  might  drift  apart,  and  leave 
between  them  a  gap.  The  Gnostics  were 
trying  to  throw  a  bridge  of  fanciful  theory 
across  that  gap,  to  treat  the  historic  human 
life  as  a  sort  of  mirage.  The  Evangelist 
hoped  to  build  a  bridge  which  might  be  a 
lasting  possession  of  the  Church.  And  he 
succeeded. 

When  we  set  side  by  side  the  character  and 
teaching  of  Jesus  as  set  forth  in  the  First  and 
the  Fourth  Gospels  respectively,  most  readers 
feel  baffled.  How  can  it  be,  we  think,  that 
a  historic  personality  should  be  so  differently 
apprehended    by  two  of  his  disciples  in  the 


100  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

century  following  his  death.  It  is  not  strange 
that  certain  hasty  and  superficial  writers  of 
our  time  should  have  come  to  the  conclusion 
that  there  was  no  historic  Jesus  at  all ;  that 
the  Christian  Messiah  was  evolved  out  of  the 
Jewish  hope  of  a  Messiah,  when  reflected  in 
a  variety  of  national  and  cultural  groups  of 
minds.  I  call  this  view  hasty  and  superficial, 
because,  as  I  think,  it  could  not  have  arisen 
in  the  mind  of  anyone  accustomed  to  weighing 
historic  evidence  and  the  formation  of  the 
fabric  of  ancient  history.  It  is  essentially  a 
caricature  of  historic  procedure.  I  shall  not 
attempt  to  disprove  it :  indeed,  it  is  sufficient 
to  refer  to  refutations  already  published.1 
But  the  best  of  all  refutations  is  to  consider 
the  parallel  case  of  Socrates.  No  one  doubts 
the  historic  existence  of  Socrates ;  yet  in  his 
case,  as  in  that  of  the  Founder  of  Christianity, 
we  have  widely  divergent  accounts  of  his 
teaching.  We  owe  to  Schleiermacher  a  com- 
parison of  the  two  cases,  of  the  lives  of  the 
Founder  of  modern  religion  and  the  Founder 
of  modern  philosophy.  Though  it  would  dis- 
tort the  plan  of  the  present  work  to  treat  of 
the  matter  quite  adequately,  I  propose  to  speak 
of  it  at  some  length. 


'£> 


1  The  best  short   account  of  this   controversy  will   be 
found  in  Loofs'  Uhat  is  the  Truth  about  Jesus  Christ  ?  1913. 


THE   WRITER'S   IDEA   OF   BIOGRAPHY     101 

There  are  extant  two  biographical  accounts  of 
Socrates.  One  is  in  the  Memorabilia  (memoirs), 
the  Symposium,  and  other  works  of  Xenophon, 
a  soldier  and  a  gentleman,  who  was  among  the 
hearers  of  Socrates,  and  wrote,  after  his  death, 
an  account  based  on  his  memory  of  what  he 
had  heard.  The  other  is  contained  in  the 
wonderful  dialogues  of  Plato,  in  which  the 
figure  of  the  great  master  stands  enshrined, 
painted  by  the  hand  of  a  consummate  artist. 
Both  of  these  biographies  were  written  early  in 
the  fourth  century,  a  considerable  time  after 
the  death  of  Socrates,  but  while  a  multitude 
of  his  friends  and  auditors  still  lived.  The 
biography  of  Xenophon  is  that  of  a  simple- 
minded  man,  of  no  .great  imaginative  or  con- 
structive power.  It  may  fairly  be  compared 
with  the  Gospel  of  Mark.  The  biography 
of  Plato  is  incomparably  superior  from  the 
literary  point  of  view  :  sometimes  it  may  be 
as  near  to  the  actual  fact  as  the  writing  of 
Xenophon  ;  but,  generally  speaking,  we  find  in 
it  rather  a  working  out  of  the  thought  of 
Socrates  by  one  who  was  a  profounder  thinker, 
but  of  far  less  striking  character.  There  is 
much  in  Plato  which  reminds  us  of  the  Fourth 
Gospel. 

Of  course  in  many  respects  all  comparison 
between   the    biographies    of    Jesus   and   the 


102  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

biographies  of  Socrates  breaks  down.  Socrates 
was  not  regarded  by  any  of  his  followers  as 
a  divine  being.  He  is  not  credited  with  any 
miracles.  After  his  death  he  did  not  become 
the  life  of  any  Church.  Our  parallel  is  only 
historical  and  literary,  not  in  the  least  religious. 
Yet  it  is  valuable  as  showing  us  how  minds 
worked  and  how  biography  was  written  in 
the  ages  when  Greece  was  the  controller  and 
director  of  the  thought  of  the  world.  Palestine, 
it  may  be  said,  was  never  dominated  by  the 
intellectual  customs  of  Athens.  That  is  only 
in  a  measure  true :  Alexandria  was  a  meeting 
point  of  Jewish  and  Greek  thought.  Rome 
was  intellectually  still  more  the  mere  follower 
of  Greece.  And  Ephesus,  a  colony  of  Athens, 
was  through  all  her  history  largely  dependent 
upon  her  mother-city  for  all  that  raised  her 
intellectually  above  the  level  of  the  barbarous 
Lydians  and  Phrygians  who  dwelt  about  her. 

When  we  read  the  Memorabilia,  we  find 
ourselves  in  contact  with  a  character  far  more 
than  with  a  thinker.  Xenophon  was  himself 
a  very  practical  man,  who  by  conducting  the 
Ten  Thousand  Greeks  right  through  the  heart 
of  Asia  Minor  proved  himself  one  of  the  great 
leaders  of  men.  He  was  devoted  to  the 
management  of  estates,  to  horsemanship,  to 
hunting.     So  it   is  natural  that  the  practical 


THE   WRITER'S   IDEA    OF   BIOGRAPHY     103 

side  of  the  personality  of  Socrates  should 
impress  him  far  more  than  the  speculative  side. 
His  Socrates  is  a  being  of  infinite  courage  and 
splendid  manliness,  whom  no  threat  and  no 
bribery  can  turn  from  the  pursuit  of  the  one 
object  which  he  has  set  before  himself.  That 
object  is  the  search  for  truth,  which  he  follows 
by  the  way  of  dialectic,  by  questioning  all  whom 
he  meets  and  testing  their  replies,  by  following 
every  clue  and  working  through  all  analogies. 
His  trust  in  reasoning  might  have  led  a  smaller 
nature,  as  in  fact  it  did  lead  many  of  the 
Sophists,  his  contemporaries,  into  pedantry. 
But  in  Socrates  there  was  little  fear  of  such  a 
decline.  He  possessed  an  astonishing  clearness 
of  insight,  which  enabled  him  to  see  all  events 
and  all  phenomena  in  the  whitest  of  lights. 
And  he  had  complete  faith  in  God  :  he  claimed 
that  in  all  his  actions  he  was  led  by  a  Divine 
purpose  and  monition,  which  warned  him  when 
he  was  verging  towards  what  was  evil,  and 
opened  for  him  a  way  towards  what  was  best. 
All  who  conversed  with  Socrates,  says 
Xenophon,  became  both  wiser  and  better. 
Statesmen  learned  to  see  the  pitfalls  which  lay 
in  their  path ;  artists  were  stimulated  to  attempt 
a  higher  line ;  soldiers  saw  the  way  of  their 
duty  more  clearly.  Children,  brothers,  friends, 
gained  a  nobler  view  of  their  ties  to  relatives 


104  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

and  associates.  If  some  of  the  pupils  of 
Socrates,  like  Critias  and  Alcibiades,  were  not 
reformed,  it  was  because,  being  of  corrupt 
nature,  they  only  sought  the  society  of  the 
master  in  order  to  learn  a  more  effective 
style  of  speaking.  Socrates  was  thoroughly 
pragmatist  in  his  notions  about  education :  he 
thought  of  all  education  as  a  training  for  a 
particular  manner  of  life ;  and  he  was  con- 
vinced that  for  every  kind  of  action,  political, 
military,  financial,  training  was  necessary.  But 
though  pragmatist,  he  was  not  sordid  :  he  held 
that  cultivation  of  intellect  and  formation  of 
character  were,  after  all,  the  great  and  only 
foundation  for  a  noble  career ;  skill  in  this  or 
that  matter  might  be  easily  acquired  by  one 
who  was,  so  to  speak,  a  trained  intellectual 
athlete. 

We  find  Socrates  in  the  Memorabilia 
maintaining,  what  in  a  Greek  shows  extreme 
originality,  that  the  beautiful  and  the  useful 
are  really  the  same.  He  often  uses  the 
language  of  the  Utilitarians  :  but  such  language 
is  only  base  when  the  notion  of  utility  is  low 
and  degraded.  He  rates  sophrosync,  self- 
control,  as  the  greatest  of  the  virtues,  and  in 
fact  as  including  them  all.  His  insight  looks 
beyond  the  worship  of  the  Greek  deities, 
though   to   this   as   a  good    citizen  he  would 


THE   WRITER'S   IDEA   OF   BIOGRAPHY     105 

carefully  conform,  to  a  Deity  who  has  pro- 
vided in  the  world  for  the  wants  of  man,  and 
has  adapted  man  to  the  frame  and  order  of 
the  world. 

But  the  feature  which  again  and  again 
impresses  us,  as  we  read  Xenophon's  work,  is 
the  complete  unity  in  Socrates  of  thought  and 
deed ;  how  he  never  reveals  a  conviction  for 
which  he  is  not  prepared  to  die  ;  how  he  never 
hesitates  in  his  certainty  of  the  Divine  purpose 
of  life,  and  the  Divine  care  of  those  who  listen 
to  the  inner  voice.  He  is  like  an  embodied 
conscience  walking  among  men,  a  glass  in 
whom  all  may  see  their  weakness  reflected,  a 
voice  which  calls  to  what  is  best,  and  which 
may  be  silenced  but  can  never  be  turned  aside. 

In  all  this  there  is  probably  little  that  is 
not  historic.  Xenophon  gives  us  a  truthful 
portrait.  But  he  does  so  not  on  principle,  for 
his  purely  fanciful  life  of  Cyrus  (the  Cyropcedia) 
proves  that  he  was  quite  capable  of  turning  a 
biography  into  a  romance.  He  depicts  things 
as  they  were  merely  because  the  reality  had 
so  deeply  impressed  him  that  his  mind  could 
not  be  diverted  into  another  channel.  And 
yet  sometimes  we  see  clearly  the  mind  of  the 
biographer  rather  than  that  of  the  master. 
For  example,  in  one  place,1  after  Socrates  has 

1  Memorabilia,  m.,  ch.  v. 


106  THE   EPHESIAN  GOSPEL 

spoken  in  his  usual  strain  to  the  son  of 
Pericles  as  to  the  necessity  of  severe  study  of 
military  matters  for  one  who  would  conduct 
a  campaign,  he  makes  suggestions  as  to  the 
actual  military  situation  which  can  scarcely 
come  from  any  but  a  practical  soldier  like 
Xenophon,  especially  since  he  speaks  of 
the  military  situation  of  the  Mysians  and 
Pisidians  of  Asia  Minor,  tribes  well  known  to 
the  leader  of  the  Ten  Thousand,  but  probably 
unknown  to  Socrates.  In  another  place,1 
Xenophon  makes  Socrates  disclaim  the  identity 
of  knowledge  and  virtue  which  was  probably 
a  doctrine  of  Socrates,  and  to  him  appropriate, 
but  one  not  suited  to  the  very  practical  turn 
of  mind  which  marks  Xenophon. 

The  manner  of  speaking  of  the  Socrates  of 
Xenophon  is  strongly  marked.  He  does  not 
discourse,  but  contents  himself  with  dialogue 
of  brief  question  and  answer.  He  shows  no 
subtlety,  lays  no  traps,  but  goes  straight  into 
the  matter  in  hand.  Almost  the  only  fable  or 
myth  which  he  narrates  is  professedly  taken 
from  Prodicus  of  Ceos  :  it  is  a  moral  apologue 
of  the  choice  of  Hercules  between  Virtue  and 
Pleasure,  strictly  ethical,  and  quite  free  from 
intellectual  speculation. 

When    we    turn    from    the     memoirs     of 

1  Memorabilia,  HI.,  ch.  ix.,  and  iv.,  ch.  vi. 


THE   WRITER'S   IDEA   OF   BIOGRAPHY     107 

Xenophon  to  the  dialogues  of  Plato  we  find 
ourselves  in  a  very  different  intellectual  atmo- 
sphere. Plato  is  infinitely  superior  to  his 
fellow  disciple  in  intellectual  force,  in  dramatic 
skill,  in  literary  accomplishment.  He  has 
made  of  Socrates  a  far  more  striking  and 
impressive  figure  than  could  Xenophon.  In 
him  the  biographical  interest  and  purpose  is 
strong ;  but  it  has  to  make  terms  with  another 
interest  which  is  even  stronger,  the  power  of 
systematic  thought,  and  the  desire  to  build 
on  a  Socratic  foundation  an  ideal  and  spiritual 
view  of  the  universe.  When  Plato,  in  his 
Crito,  P/icedo  and  Apology  of  Soci'atcs,  treats 
of  the  last  days  of  his  master,  the  poignant 
interest  of  the  facts  and  the  sublime  courage 
of  the  hero  overpower  him.  His  account  of 
these  days,  apart  from  the  subtle  theories  dis- 
cussed, is  probably  almost  as  accurate  as  that 
of  Xenophon,  while  it  is  at  the  same  time 
much  more  detailed  and  at  a  loftier  tragic 
level.  The  picture  which  Plato  draws  of  the 
daily  life  of  Socrates,  his  scanty  clothing,  his 
bare  feet,  his  immovable  temper,  his  kindly 
humour,  is  drawn  by  a  consummate  artist. 
But  when  we  come  to  Plato's  account  of  the 
talk  of  his  master,  we  see  at  once  how  strongly 
refracting  is  the  atmosphere.  Socrates  both 
loses  and  gains.     He  loses  the  simple  direct- 


108  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

ness,  the  intense  ethical  purpose,  the  consistent 
determination  to  see  only  what  really  exists, 
which  are  so  conspicuous  in  Xenophon's 
memoirs.  But  he  also  gains.  With  con- 
summate skill  he  leads  his  interlocutors  from 
point  to  point ;  with  delicate  irony  he  professes 
to  be  only  anxious  to  learn,  and  to  have  no 
pretension  to  teach.  And  after  long  discus- 
sion he  sometimes  breaks  out  into  a  discourse 
of  a  more  constructive  character.  When  he 
does  not  feel  capable  of  clearly  tracing  the 
outline  of  his  creed  on  some  deep  subject, 
he  falls  back  on  a  tale  or  myth,  in  which 
he  explains  by  symbolism  what  cannot  well 
be  set  forth  by  system. 

But  the  most  striking  parts  of  the  teaching 
of  the  dialogues,  the  doctrine  of  the  immor- 
tality of  the  soul,  the  nature  of  justice  in 
an  individual  and  in  the  state,  the  careful 
devices  for  training  the  young,  and  more 
particularly  the  doctrine  of  ideas,  are  not 
the  views  of  Socrates  but  of  Plato.1  The 
Socrates  of  Xenophon  must  have  worked  in 
the  city  of  Athens  as  an  intellectual  and 
moral  tonic,  and  must  have  made  hundreds 


1  I  must  ask  pardon  if  I  state  dogmatically  what  I  cannot 
here  prove.  I  am  aware  that  Professor  John  Burnet  has 
in  an  able  recent  work  {From  Thales  to  Plato)  taken  the 
opposite  view ;  but  he  has  not  convinced  me. 


THE   WRITER'S   IDEA    OF   BIOGRAPHY     109 

feel  that  a  life  of  search  for  truth  and  of 
devotion  to  the  will  of  God  revealed  within 
was  the  only  noble  life.  But  he  would  never, 
as  did  Plato,  lay  a  foundation  on  which 
systems  of  ideal  and  spiritual  philosophy 
could  be  built  up  through  all  ages.  The 
Cynics,  those  Friars  of  the  Pagan  world, 
may  represent  a  side  of  Socrates  in  exaggera- 
tion. But  the  other  ancient  schools — the 
Academics,  the  Peripatetics,  the  Stoics,  and  at 
a  later  time  the  Neo-Platonists  and  Mystics 
— owe  their  existence  in  a  great  measure  to 
the  thought  of  Plato,  whether  by  following 
him,  or  by  reacting  against  him.  The  doctrine 
of  ideas  in  particular,  the  view  that  the  visible 
world  is  a  mere  copy  and  manifestation  of 
realities  hidden  in  the  spiritual  realm,  has, 
ever  since  the  time  of  Plato,  been  the  great 
corrective  to  the  natural  materialism  of 
mankind,  and  helped  them  to  look  beyond 
the  things  which  can  be  seen  to  the  things 
which  cannot  be  seen,  but  which  exist  eter- 
nally in  the  world  of  the  ideal.  But  this 
doctrine  seems  to  have  been  foreign  to  the 
mind  of  the  historic  Socrates.  It  seems, 
indeed,  to  belong  only  to  the  latter  years 
of  Plato. 

It  is,  of  course,  with  the  memoirs  of  Socrates 
by  Xenophon    that   we   would   compare   the 


110  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

Synoptic  writers  or  the  authorities  whom  they 
follow,  and  with  the  dialogues  of  Plato  we 
would  compare  the  discourses  in  the  Fourth 
Gospel.  Doubtless  the  comparison  will  not 
hold  in  all  respects,  though  it  is  sufficiently 
close  to  be  illuminating.  Both  writers  re- 
interpret the  simple  teaching  of  tradition  in 
the  light  of  a  spiritual  mysticism.  In  parti- 
cular we  may  dwell  on  two  points  —  the 
account  of  the  death  of  Jesus  in  the  Fourth 
Gospel,  and  the  careful  and  artificial  construc- 
tion of  the  dialogues  there  reported. 

It  is  noteworthy  that  the  Fourth  Evangelist, 
just  like  Plato,  is  far  more  detailed,  and 
probably  more  strictly  historic,  when  he  gives 
an  account  of  the  last  days  of  his  hero.  In 
the  general  narrative  we  find  no  consistent 
sketch  of  time  and  place,  "After  these  things" 
and  "  not  many  days  "  are  the  vague  phrases 
sometimes  used  in  regard  to  time ;  while  the 
scene  shifts  from  place  to  place,  and  is  indeed 
of  no  great  importance,  and  its  appearance  of 
exactness  is  to  a  great  extent  an  illusion.  The 
Evangelist  is  careful  to  attach  some  of  the 
discourses  to  particular  scenes :  and  '  here 
there  is  very  probably  some  foundation  in 
tradition ;  but  he  does  not  produce  anything 
like  a  consecutive  biography.  We  find  no 
gradual    development   of    a   situation.       But 


THE   WRITER'S   IDEA    OF   BIOGRAPHY     111 

when  he  comes  to  the  end,  he  is  far  fuller 
of  detail,  and  far  more  vivid.  And  the 
reason  is,  no  doubt,  the  same  as  that  which 
we  have  conjectured  in  the  case  of  Plato. 
The  Apostolic  tradition  naturally  dwelt  more 
fully  on  the  sufferings  and  the  death  of  the 
Master ;  and  on  the  mind  of  the  Evangelist 
they  were  more  vividly  stamped,  in  propor- 
tion to  the  frequency  with  which  he  had 
heard  of  them,  and  their  natural  intense  pathos. 
Whether,  nevertheless,  he  consciously  trans- 
posed them  in  deference  to  a  theological 
interest  is  a  further  question. 

In  the  memoirs  of  Xenophon  the  talk  is 
comparatively  simple  and  artless.  Socrates 
goes  straight  to  the.  point,  and  those  who 
converse  with  him  make  objections  which 
seem  to  us  natural.  But  Plato's  dialogues 
are  carefully  constructed,  and  the  course  of 
them  thought  out  from  the  beginning.  With 
great  skill  the  writer  uses  the  replies  of  the 
hearers  of  Socrates  to  bring  out  point  after 
point  of  his  argument.  These  hearers  grow 
angry  at  the  right  point ;  they  reflect  the 
attitudes  assumed  by  different  classes  of  men 
in  the  city;  they  give  way  and  retire  when 
the  stage  is  suitable  tc  a  mere  detailed  and 
elaborate  exposition  by  the  great  protagonist. 
A   parallel,  if  not   quite   a   similar   contrast, 


112  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

may  be  observed  between  the  discourses  of 
Jesus  in  the  Synoptists  and  those  in  the 
Fourth  Gospel.  In  the  former  Jesus  does 
not  argue,  he  teaches  with  authority.  Some- 
times, indeed,  a  question  put  by  a  bystander, 
such  as  that  as  to  giving  tribute  to  Csesar, 
and  that  as  to  the  non-observance  of  the 
Sabbath  by  the  Apostles,  gives  occasion  for 
an  admirable  saying.  But  here  the  questions 
are  such  as  would  naturally  be  asked ;  and 
both  question  and  answer  are  probably  historic ; 
they  are  sayings  exactly  of  the  kind  which 
linger  in  the  memory  of  the  hearer.  But 
when  we  turn  to  the  Johannine  dialogues 
between  Jesus  and  the  Jews,  we  find  a  far 
more  elaborate  construction. 

Let  us  briefly  analyse  three  of  the  most 
characteristic  Johannine  discourses:  (1)  that 
with  Nicodemus  (ch.  hi.),  (2)  that  with  the 
woman  of  Samaria  (ch.  iv.),  and  (3)  that  with 
the  Jews  at  Capernaum  (ch.  vi.).  In  each  of 
these  we  shall  distinguish  (a)  the  occasion, 
(b)  the  thesis,  (c)  the  misunderstanding,  (d)  the 
development.       i 

(la)  The  occasion  of  this  discourse  is  the 
visit  of  Nicodemus  to  Jesus  by  night.  The 
appropriateness  of  this  occasion  lies  in  the 
fact  that  a  highly  educated  Jew  ought  to 
have  known  the  doctrine  of  the  higher  life, 


THE   WRITER'S   IDEA   OF   BIOGRAPHY     113 

the  life  of  the  Spirit ;  but  he  does  not :  "  Art 
thou  a  teacher  in  Israel  and  understandest 
not  these  things?"  (lb)  The  thesis  is  that 
man  must  be  born  again  of  the  Spirit  before 
he  can  enter  into  life,  (lc)  Nicodemus  falls 
into  a  vulgar  and  materialist  error  of  inter- 
pretation :  "  How  can  a  man  be  born  when 
he  is  old  ?  Can  he  enter  a  second  time  into 
his  mother's  womb  ? "  And  (Id)  this  crassness 
acts  as  a  foil  to  the  exposition  which  follows 
as  to  the  action  of  the  Spirit,  which  is  like 
that  of  the  wind,  unseen  and  unexpected, 
breathing  now  here  and  now  there,  and 
bestowing  the  gift  of  spiritual  birth. 

(2a)  The  occasion  at  Sychar  is  the  thirst 
of  Jesus,  which  prompts  Him  to  ask  a  draught 
of  the  woman  of  Samaria.  It  emphasises  the 
essential  unity  of  mankind,  as  a  thirsty  man 
does  not  ask  whether  the  person  who  has 
water  to  give  him  is  of  his  own  or  of  an 
alien  race.  (2b)  The  thesis  is  that  there  is  a 
stream  of  living  water,  of  which  a  man  may 
drink  to  satisfy  a  higher  craving.  (2c)  The 
Samaritan  woman  thinks  that  this  living 
water  is  an  actual  fluid,  the  magic  effect  of 
which  is  to  prevent  the  feeling  of  thirst  in 
the  future.  (2c?)  Thence  arises  the  discourse 
of  Jesus  as  to  the  fountain  open  to  all  man- 
kind who    call   upon   God  in  spirit  and   sin- 


114  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

cerity :  open,  that  is,  to  all  of  mankind  who 
receive  the  Divine  Word,  and  believe  on 
the  Saviour. 

(3a)  The  occasion  at  Capernaum  is  that 
some  of  the  Jews,  having  had  their  hunger 
miraculously  satisfied,  follow  Jesus  as  one 
who  can  easily  supply  their  material  wants. 
(3b)  The  thesis  is  that  there  is  a  heavenly 
bread  which  abides  unto  eternal  life,  a  bread 
which  comes  down  from  heaven  and  gives 
life  to  the  world.  This  bread  is  the  flesh 
of  the  Son  of  Man.  (3c)  The  Jews,  with 
their  customary  materialist  crassness,  ask  a 
question  exactly  parallel  to  the  question  of 
Nicodemus  and  the  Samaritan  woman  :  "  How 
can  this  man  give  us  his  flesh  to  eat  ?  How 
can  he  say  that  he  came  down  from  heaven  ? 
Is  he  not  the  son  of  Joseph?"  (3d)  Not  in 
so  orderly  a  fashion  as  in  the  other  cases,  but 
clearly  enough  for  any  careful  reader,  Jesus 
turns  the  discourse  in  a  spiritual  direction. 
He  that  eats  of  the  spiritual  bread  shall  live 
for  ever,  not  like  those  who  ate  in  the  wilder- 
ness the  manna  which  fell  from  the  sky,  and 
yet  died.  Jesus  is  the  bread  of  life,  and  of 
spiritual  origin  ;  He  came  down  from  heaven 
because  He  came  not  to  do  His  own  will,  but 
the  will  of  Him  that  sent  Him. 

I  do  not  pretend  here  to  develop  the  full 


THE   WRITER'S   IDEA   OF   BIOGRAPHY     115 

meaning  of  these  sayings.  There  are  elements 
in  them  of  which  I  am  not  now  speaking, 
but  to  which  I  shall  return  when  I  treat  of 
the  Johannine  doctrine  of  the  Sacraments. 
At  present  I  only  wish  to  direct  attention  to 
the  form  of  these  discourses,  and  to  insist  on 
their  artistic  scheme.  In  manner  they  are 
totally  different  from  the  discourses  reported 
by  the  Synoptists.  And  the  view  has  spread, 
and  become  almost  axiomatic  with  most 
trained  critics,  that  this  form  belongs  alto- 
gether to  the  Fourth  Evangelist.  Materialism 
has  been  a  besetting  fault  of  the  common 
people  among  the  Jews  in  all  ages  ;  though, 
on  the  other  hand,  it  would  be  difficult  to 
find  a  nobler  spiritualism  than  is  to  be  traced 
in  such  books  as  Isaiah  and  the  Psalter. 
But  this  particular  kind  of  materialist  mis- 
interpretation seems  too  crass  to  represent 
the  tone  of  any  people.  When  the  Fourth 
Evangelist  says  "the  Jews,"  he  means  the 
enemies  of  the  Christian  Church,  and  he 
takes  them  on  the  lowest  and  most  ignorant 
level. 

In  the  Johannine  discourses  of  Jesus,  and 
more  especially  in  the  long  monologue  towards 
the  end  of  the  Gospel,  we  feel  that  it  is  not 
the  visible  and  audible  Jesus  who  is  speaking, 
but  the  Christ  who  is  the  life  of  the  Church, 


116  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

and  who  is  revealing  Himself  in  the  spirit. 
No  doubt  this  is  a  view  which  will  be  very- 
repugnant  to  many  Christians,  who  have  been 
accustomed  to  find  in  the  wonderful  words 
of  these  discourses  a  message  heard  by  an 
eye-witness,  and  preserved  for  the  encourage- 
ment of  the  Church.  If  they  do  not  come 
from  the  very  lips  of  the  Master,  they  seem 
to  lose  their  unique  authority.  They  have 
been  for  ages  a  main  source  and  a  strong 
stay  of  the  spiritual  life.  And  if  a  Christian 
does  not  take  up  the  historic  question,  but 
reads  only  for  edification,  he  may  well  think 
of  the  Johannine  sayings  as  coming  from  his 
Lord  during  His  lifetime,  just  as  he  may 
think  of  the  Ten  Commandments  as  given  to 
Moses  by  Jehovah  engraved  upon  tables  of 
stone.  People  whose  whole  tone  of  thought 
is  literal  must  literally  interpret  the  inspired 
Scriptures.  But  they  may  still  remember 
the  saying  of  a  notable  modern  Christian, 
Cardinal  Newman,  that  to  the  Christian 
religion  a  figurative  interpretation  of  the 
Bible  is  a  necessary  condition. 

But  for  those  whose  minds  are  cast  in  a 
historic  mould,  who  want  to  know  what  really 
took  place  at  the  time  of  the  Christian  origins, 
it  is  quite  impossible  to  regard  the  speeches 
given  to  Jesus  by  th$  Fourth  Evangelist  as 


THE   WRITER'S   IDEA    OF   BIOGRAPHY     117 

actually  so  uttered.  If  Jesus  had  been  in  the 
habit  of  thus  openly  proclaiming  Himself  as 
the  Son  of  God,  the  light  of  the  world,  the 
trial  before  Pilate  must  have  taken  a  very 
different  turn.  We  read  in  Mark  that  there 
was  a  great  difficulty  in  finding  evidence  that 
Jesus  had  claimed  a  divine  origin ;  and  the 
most  definite  point  brought  forward  against 
Him  was  that  He  had  said  that  if  the  temple 
were  destroyed  He  could  build  it  again  in  three 
days,  a  very  obvious  materialist  distortion  of 
Jesus'  teaching  as  to  the  unimportance  of  mere 
places  and  rites.  Even  in  the  Johannine 
account  of  the  trial,  the  main  accusation 
brought  against  Jesus  is  that  He  claimed  to 
be  a  king  of  a  spiritual  realm,  a  claim  which 
Pilate  does  not  regard  as  punishable.  Had 
Jesus  openly  made  the  claims  which  He  is  said 
in  the  Fourth  Gospel  to  have  made,  His  life 
would  much  earlier  have  been  sacrificed.  In 
the  Synoptic  writings  we  can  see  how  the 
notion  that  Jesus  was  the  promised  Messiah 
slowly  penetrated  the  minds  of  the  Apostles  ; 
but  in  the  Fourth  Gospel  Jesus  is  proclaimed 
by  the  Baptist  as  born  to  take  away  the  sins 
of  the  world.  And  throughout  Jesus  speaks 
of  Himself  as  the  light  of  the  world  and  the 
life  of  men,  as  the  Head  of  a  great  spiritual 
society  and  a  direct  revelation  of  God.     His 


118  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

way  of  speaking,  as  we  know  from  abundant 
evidence,  was  on  a  quite  different  plane. 

No !  It  was  not  Jesus  of  Nazareth  who 
spoke  thus,  but  the  exalted  Christ  who  came 
to  inspire  the  Apostles  after  the  death  on  the 
cross,  who  arrested  St  Paul  in  his  career  of 
persecution,  who  was  the  life  and  spirit  of  the 
Church,  in  whom  alike  individuals  and  the 
community  lived  with  a  new  and  spiritual 
life. 

Sometimes  the  Evangelist,  by  a  natural  in- 
consistency, reveals  his  plan  of  writing.  For 
he  puts  into  the  mouth  of  Jesus  utterances 
which  imply  that  His  life  on  earth  was  at  an 
end.  He  slips  from  the  present  into  the  past 
tense.  Thus  in  hi.  13,  Jesus  is  represented  as 
speaking  of  His  descent  from  heaven  and  His 
ascending  thither,  and  adds,  "  the  Son  of  Man 
who  is  in  heaven."  The  authenticity  of  these 
words  is,  however,  doubtful ;  and  if  they  are 
genuine  it  may  be  maintained  that  they  are 
really  the  words  of  the  Evangelist,  and  that 
the  sayings  of  Jesus  end  with  the  previous 
verse:  if  so,  it  proves  how  little  the  writer 
cares  to  separate  the  words  which  he  attributes 
to  his  Master  from  those  which  he  speaks  in 
his  own  person.  A  better  example  can  be 
found  in  chapters  xvi.  and  xvii.  In  xvi.  4 
we  read,  "  These  things  I  said  not  unto  you 


THE   WRITER'S   IDEA   OF   BIOGRAPHY     119 

from  the  beginning,  because  I  was  with  you." 
And  in  xvii.  12  we  read,  "  While  I  was  with 
them  I  kept  them  in  Thy  name  which  Thou 
hast  given  Me,  and  I  guarded  them."  Here 
again  it  may  be  maintained  that  these  words, 
spoken  on  the  last  evening,  refer  to  a  life 
virtually,  though  not  actually,  ended  ;  but  it 
is  simpler  to  suppose  that  the  writer  is  think- 
ing of  the  life  of  Jesus  on  earth  as  in 
the  past. 

There  are  other  passages  with  a  similar 
bearing.  In  the  last  great  discourse  of  Jesus 
we  read,  "  The  hour  cometh  when  I  shall  no 
more  speak  unto  you  in  parables,  but  shall 
tell  you  plainly  of  the  Father."  Every  reader 
of  the  First  Gospel  knows  how  plainly  in  the 
Sermon  on  the  Mount  and  elsewhere  Jesus 
speaks  of  the  Father  in  Heaven.  The 
Evangelist  must  be  thinking  of  further  revela- 
tions of  God  made  to  the  Church  after  the 
Crucifixion.  Later  on,  in  the  same  discourse, 
Jesus  says,  in  His  prayer,  "  I  finished  the  work 
which  Thou  hast  given  Me  to  do."  How  in- 
congruous and  unnatural  such  words  must 
seem,  if  spoken  before  that  suffering  which 
was  near  at  hand,  even  before  the  scene  in  the 
Garden  of  Gethsemane !  They  can  only  be 
natural  when  applied,  from  the  point  of  view 
of  the  Church,  to  the  whole  life  and  death  of 


120  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

its  Founder.  We  must  accept  one  of  two 
views.  Either  Jesus  was  continually  speaking 
to  His  disciples  in  a  way  which  they  could  not 
understand,  in  virtue  of  a  superhuman  know- 
ledge peculiar  to  Himself,  or  else  the  Fourth 
Evangelist  has  put  into  His  mouth  words 
which  belong  not  to  the  visible,  but  to  the 
exalted  Christ. 

A  passage  which  throws  light  on  the 
Evangelist's  way  of  working,  and  the  method 
in  which  he  adapts  the  traditional  teaching 
of  Jesus  to  his  own  point  of  view,  is  to  be 
found  in  that  remarkable  saying  in  the  seventh 
chapter,  "  He  that  believeth  on  Me,  as  the 
Scripture  hath  said,  out  of  his  body  shall  flow 
rivers  of  living  water."  The  commentators 
are  unable  to  find  this  phrase  (or  rather  the 
latter  part  of  it,  for  it  is  the  latter  part  which 
is  important)  in  the  books  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment. But  Jesus  is  said  to  have  uttered  the 
phrase  during  the  Feast  of  Tabernacles,  one 
ceremony  of  which  was  that  a  priest  daily 
brought  water  in  a  golden  vessel  from  the 
pool  of  Siloam  in  procession,  and  poured  it 
out  on  the  altar ;  and  this  gives  a  natural 
occasion  for  the  exclamation.  We  are  told 
that  this  ceremony  was  by  some  Rabbis  in- 
terpreted as  a  symbol  of  the  outpouring  of 
the    Spirit   as   spoken   of  by    Isaiah   (xii.    3). 


THE    WRITER'S   IDEA   OF   BIOGRAPHY     121 

That  the  Evangelist  was  repeating  some 
traditional  saying  of  Jesus,  which  he  had  heard 
repeated,  is  by  far  most  probable,  though  he 
is  mistaken  as  to  its  being  a  quotation  from 
Scripture,  and  it  is  almost  certain  that  the 
words  have  been  modified,  and  the  original 
sense  somewhat  changed.  But  when  the 
Evangelist  has  written  them,  he  sees  that, 
taken  in  the  sense  in  which  he  takes  them, 
they  are  not  suitable  to  the  lifetime  of  Jesus. 
So  he  adds,  "  This  spake  He  of  the  Spirit, 
which  they  that  believed  on  Him  were  to 
receive :  for  the  Spirit  was  not  yet  given." 
To  his  mode  of  thinking,  which  was  entirely 
unhistoric,  it  does  not  seem  incongruous  that 
his  Master  should  have  uttered  words  which 
would  be  unintelligible  to  the  disciples,  and 
only  full  of  meaning  to  their  successors  many 
years  later. 

To  this  we  may  add  that  sometimes,  even 
in  the  midst  of  words  attributed  to  Jesus 
Himself,  the  Evangelist  forgets  himself,  and 
breaks  out  into  words  of  assertion  or  con- 
troversy quite  unsuitable  to  the  connection, 
and  only  fit  for  the  synagogue  or  the  church 
assembly.  One  of  the  most  remarkable  of 
these  lapses  is  in  the  discourse  to  Nicodemus.1 
Jesus  has  been  uttering  lofty  truths,  and  when 

1  John  iii.  11. 


122  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

Nicodemus  fails  to  understand  them,  tells  him 
that  as  one  of  the  teachers  of  Israel  he  ought 
already  to  have  been  acquainted  with  them. 
Then  comes  the  extraordinary  verse,  "  We 
speak  that  we  do  know  and  bear  witness  of  that 
we  have  seen  ;  and  ye  receive  not  our  witness." 
In  a  dialogue  between  two  persons  the  we 
and  the  ye  are  quite  unintelligible.  But  if  we 
turn  to  the  last  verse  of  the  Gospel  we  find  a 
parallel.  "  This  is  the  disciple  which  beareth 
witness  of  these  things,  .  .  .  and  we  know 
that  his  witness  is  true."  In  the  Epistle  the 
phrase  "  we  know "  occurs  nearly  twenty 
times :  it  has  evidently  slipped  into  the 
discourse  to  Nicodemus  by  mistake. 

Thus  the  Gospel,  ill  spite  of  its  majesty 
of  style  and  high  unity  of  thought,  is  from 
a  critical  point  of  view  a  tangled  skein.  We 
have  the  greatest  difficulty  in  separating  in 
it  what  came  from  tradition,  what  belongs  to 
the  experience  of  the  Church,  and  what  is 
added  in  the  way  of  comment  and  back- 
ground by  the  Evangelist  himself.  That  the 
Gospel  is  divinely  inspired  I  strongly  hold, 
and  especially  inspired  in  being  adapted  to 
further  high  Christian  thought  in  ways  which 
the  writer  only  dimly  foresaw.  It  is  a  fruit 
of  the  Christian  tree  of  life.  But  inspiration 
does   not  work   by  giving   the  inspired    man 


THE    WRITER'S   IDEA   OF   BIOGRAPHY     123 

a  direct  knowledge  of  events  which  have 
happened  in  the  world :  that  is  not  the  char- 
acter of  inspiration.  He  may  be  careless  of 
fact,  or  misled  by  incorrect  information,  nor 
is  he  in  any  way  infallible ;  but  he  is  an 
exponent  of  the  life  of  the  Spirit  under  the 
forms  of  his  own  age. 


VI 

THE  BASIS  IN  CHRISTIAN 
EXPERIENCE 

The  first,  and  the  most  important,  of  the 
strands  whereof  this  Gospel  is  made  up  is 
that  of  Christian  Experience.  The  phrase  in 
modern  days  of  over-individualism  has  a  sub- 
jective sound :  to  us  it  means  in  the  first  place 
the  secret  realities  of  the  converse  of  the  spirit 
with  God.  To  one  accustomed  to  the  far 
less  individual  life  of  early  Christian  days,  this 
would  not  be  the  primary  significance.  The 
days  of  the  city-state,  when  every  man  merged 
his  existence  in  a  great  degree  in  the  life  of 
the  community,  were  passing  away.  But  much 
of  the  common  feeling  which  it  had  fostered 
survived.  And  even  in  our  age,  which  has 
seen  so  marked,  and  in  many  ways  so  disas- 
trous, a  growth  of  national  and  racial  passion, 
it  is  hard  to  realise  the  place  taken  by  patriot- 
ism  and   racial   feeling   in  ancient  days.     A 

124 


THE  BASIS  IN  CHRISTIAN  EXPERIENCE    125 

reading  of  some  of  Plutarch's  Lives  helps  one 
in  this  matter  as  much  as  anything  can. 
Probably  none  of  the  races  of  the  ancient 
world  had  a  more  strongly  developed  sense 
of  the  corporate  life  than  the  Jews.  The 
stories  of  Jael  and  Sisera  and  of  Judith  show 
how,  in  the  opinion  of  the  people,  no  act  of 
treachery  or  cruelty  was  wrong,  if  it  tended 
to  the  preservation  of  Israel. 

The  Roman  peace  had,  it  is  true,  in  the  case 
of  most  peoples,  except  the  Jews,  somewhat 
blunted  the  edge  of  this  general  patriotism. 
Religious  feeling,  also,  was  turning  away  from 
the  merely  patriotic  cults  to  those  which 
gave  more  scope  for  personal  reliance  on  the 
unseen  and  spiritual.  But  it  takes  many 
generations  before  feelings  deeply  impressed 
upon  the  minds  of  men  are  effaced.  And 
still,  in  Western  Asia,  men's  minds  were 
largely  dominated  by  the  racial  and  civic 
ideal. 

Thus  to  thinkers  of  the  time  experience 
would  be  collective  rather  than  individual. 
The  Christian  Church  had  taken,  in  the  minds 
of  all  the  followers  of  Christ,  the  place  of  city 
and  nation,  and  to  it  the  shoots  which  arose 
from  the  ground  of  collectivism  naturally 
clung.  It  is  the  experience  of  the  Christian 
Church,  rather  than  his  own  private  spiritual 


126  THE   EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

history,  on  which  the  Fourth  Evangelist  bases 
his  Christology. 

This  transference  of  social  consciousness 
from  a  city  or  a  state  to  a  religious  society 
was  no  new  thing  in  the  history  of  mankind. 
The  Jews  of  the  Dispersion,  who  in  the 
Hellenistic  age  were  scattered  abroad  over  all 
lands  from  Rome  to  Babylon,  found  their  unity 
in  their  religion,  in  their  relation  to  the  God 
of  Israel,  and  through  Him  to  one  another, 
much  more  than  in  any  mere  racial  feeling. 
They  freely  proselytised  and  welcomed  to  their 
community  all  who  would  accept  Jehovah  as 
their  God,  and  would  keep  the  law  given  by 
Him  to  His  people.  There  had  also  arisen, 
in  the  region  of  the  Eastern  Mediterranean,  a 
variety  of  mystic  sects,  the  votaries  of  Isis  of 
Sabazius  or  of  Mithras,  to  whose  adherents 
the  relation  to  their  patron  deity  and  their 
fellow  sectaries  was  the  closest  and  most 
sacred  bond  which  they  recognised.  If  we 
rank  these  societies  with  the  Fellowship  of 
Christ,  we  no  doubt  judge  superficially,  as 
did  the  Roman  authorities,  who  put  all  these 
new  cults  on  the  same  footing,  and  saw  in 
them  all  a  danger  to  extreme  patriotism. 
What  is  true  is  that  they  belonged  to  the 
same  genus  as  Christianity,  but  were  infinitely 
inferior    species    of    the    genus.      And    they 


THE  BASIS  IN  CHRISTIAN  EXPERIENCE    127 

certainly  tended,  perhaps  even  more  than  the 
Jewish  Dispersion  had  tended,  to  prepare  the 
way  for  Christianity,  and  to  incline  the  hearts 
of  men  to  accept  it.  Thus  St  Paul  found  that 
on  his  missionary  journeys  it  was  precisely 
the  cities  most  affected  by  the  new  tendencies 
of  religion,  such  cities  as  Antioch,  Corinth, 
Ephesus,  and  Colossse,  which  were  most  ready 
to  receive  the  word. 

St  Paul  was  the  preacher  of  a  mystic  com- 
munion, which  in  the  time  of  the  Fourth 
Evangelist  had  already  struck  deep  roots,  and 
was  bearing  in  the  Churches  of  Asia  the  fruits 
of  a  redeemed  and  exalted  life. 

The  Christian  consciousness  of  the  Evan- 
gelist, on  the  whole,  moves  on  lines  much  like 
those  on  which  St  Paul's  moved.  It  is  almost 
certain  that  he  was  a  convert  of  St  Paul,  or 
at  all  events  that  he  belonged  to  a  society 
moulded  on  the  Pauline  ideas.  There  were 
three  Christian .  Churches  in  particular  which 
looked  up  to  St  Paul  as  their  founder  :  those  of 
Galatia,  Corinth,  and  Ephesus.  The  Epistles 
to  the  Galatians  and  Corinthians  show  us  with 
what  intense  love  St  Paul  regarded  those 
Churches,  and  how  no  mere  bodily  absence 
prevented  him  from  keeping  up  with  them  a 
close  spiritual  sympathy.  With  regard  to  the 
Church  at  Ephesus  we  know  much  less,  but 


128  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

the  address  to  the  Ephesian  Presbyters  at 
Miletus  shows  a  very  close  union  in  love  and 
in  doctrine  between  the  Apostle  and  them. 
The  Pauline  view  was  that  the  Christian 
Church  was  the  earthly  body  of  Christ,  that 
every  member  of  it  was  in  direct  union  with 
Christ  as  his  Head  and  his  Saviour,  that  one 
spiritual  life  ran  through  the  Head  and  the 
limbs,  and  that  to  the  common  life  the 
individual  Christian  owed  his  ability  to  live  a 
Christ-life  on  earth,  and  his  hope  of  a  blessed 
life  hereafter.  This  was  the  root  of  all  the 
Pauline  theology.  And  it  could  scarcely  be 
called  a  doctrine,  for  it  had  in  it  no  reasoning, 
no  theory,  little  of  the  intellectual  element ; 
rather  it  was  a  mere  throwing  into  words  of 
the  daily  experience  of  the  infant  Society. 

This  experience,  and  this  doctrine,  if  doctrine 
it  may  be  called,  is  the  most  conspicuous  feature 
of  the  Fourth  Gospel.  That  it  could  not  be- 
long to  the  lifetime  of  the  Founder  is  evident ; 
the  kind  of  communion  involved  in  it  was 
spiritual,  and  not  possible  while  the  disciples 
saw  and  conversed  with  their  Master  day  by 
day.  The  Evangelist  himself  expresses  this 
in  several  passages  :  "  It  is  expedient  for  you 
that  I  go  away  "  ;  "  Blessed  are  those  that  have 
not  seen,  and  yet  have  believed."  His  plan, 
whether  it  was  a  right  or  a  wrong  one,  to  work 


THE  BASIS  IN  CHRISTIAN  EXPERIENCE    129 

out  this  Christian  experience  in  the  form  of 
a  biography,  necessarily  involved,  as  we  see 
clearly,  the  production  of  a  non-natural,  a 
scarcely-  human  Jesus  ;  but  the  transposition 
does  not  prevent  him  from  setting  forth  the 
realities  of  the  converse  between  the  Church 
and  her  Lord  in  a  series  of  sayings  and  simili- 
tudes which  are  of  imperishable  power  and 
divine  beauty.  Let  us  turn  to  some  aspects 
of  that  converse. 

The  first  point  to  notice  is  that  the  Society 
is  an  exclusive  one,  apart  from  the  world, 
which  is  described  as  a  hostile  medium.  "  If 
ye  were  of  the  world,  the  world  would  love  its 
own  ;  but  because  ye  are  not  of  the  world,  but 
I  chose  you  out  of  the  world,  therefore  the 
world  hateth  you."  In  many  other  passages 
the  world  is  thus  spoken  of  as  an  enemy  and  a 
persecutor  ;  but  it  cannot  destroy  the  Society. 
"  In  the  world  ye  shall  have  tribulation  ;  but 
be  of  good  cheer,  I  have  overcome  the  world." 
To  the  Evangelist  in  most  of  his  moods,  as  to 
St  Paul,  the  Church  is  the  only  way  of  salva- 
tion. "  No  man  cometh  to  the  Father  but  by 
Me."  And  this  view  is  insisted  on  in  the 
well-known  parable  in  which  Christ  is  spoken 
of  as  the  door  of  the  sheepfold,  by  passing 
through  which  only,  the  sheep  can  be  safe. 
In  a  slightly  varied  image   Christ  is  spoken 

9 


130  THE   EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

of  as  the  only  true  shepherd  of  the  sheep, 
others  who  claim  to  be  shepherds  being  only 
robbers. 

The  first-fruits  of  an  entry  into  the  Society 
is  a  consciousness  that  the  union  with  the  in- 
dwelling Christ  results  in  the  forgiveness  of 
sins.  Both  St  Paul  and  the  Evangelist  throw 
the  forgiveness  of  sins  into  a  quasi-historic 
setting.  St  Paul1  speaks  of  redemption 
through  the  blood  of  Christ ;  and  the  Evan- 
gelist in  his  Epistle  writes,  "  The  blood  of  Jesus, 
His  Son,  cleanseth  us  from  all  sin."  Later 
writers  work  out  this  theme  in  a  systematic 
way,  and  represent  the  death  on  the  cross  as 
a  full  and  sufficient  sacrifice  to  do  away  the 
sins  of  all  those  who  have  faith  in  Christ.  At 
first  this  teaching  is  implicit  rather  than  ex- 
pressed. The  Evangelist  writes,  "God  so  loved 
the  world  that  He  gave  His  only- begotten 
Son,  that  whosoever  believeth  in  Him  should 
not  perish  but  have  eternal  life " ;  and  it  is 
noteworthy  that  he  does  not  in  this  passage 
mean  only  the  death  on  the  cross ;  it  is  the 
life  rather  than  the  death,  and  especially  the 
exalted  life  after  death,  of  the  Saviour  of 
which  he  is  thinking.  Again,  both  St  Paul 
and  the  Evangelist  connect  the  forgiveness 
of  sins  especially  with  the  rite  of  baptism. 
»  Epk.  i.  7;  Col.  i.  14. 


THE  BASIS  IN  CHRISTIAN  EXPERIENCE    131 

Here  again  it  is  later  writers  who  fully  carry 
out  the  idea.  In  a  later  chapter  I  shall  treat 
in  more  detail  of  the  teaching  of  the  Evan- 
gelist in"  regard  to  the  Sacraments. 

Though  there  is  no  great  difference  between 
the  doctrine  of  sin  and  its  forgiveness  held  by 
St  Paul  and  that  preached  by  the  Fourth 
Evangelist,  yet  in  the  writings  of  the  latter 
this  doctrine  does  not  hold  anything  like  so 
large  a  place  as  it  does  in  the  Pauline  Epistles. 
This  may  well  be  accounted  for  on  the  grounds 
of  experience.  St  Paul's  conversion  was  the 
result  of  a  bitter  inward  conflict ;  he  was 
driven  to  Christ  by  the  conviction  that  so,  and 
so  only,  he  could  escape  from  the  thraldom  of 
sin.  The  escape  from  that  servitude  loomed 
so  large  in  his  mind  that  he  constantly  recurs 
to  it ;  and  he  seems  to  expect  his  converts 
to  pass  through  the  same  terrible  conflict. 
The  Fourth  Evangelist  had  never  been  a  perse- 
cutor of  the  Church ;  he  had  never  fought 
hard  against  the  influence  of  the  Divine 
Spirit.  He  had  not  therefore  the  same  intense 
feeling  in  regard  to  sin.  Rather  he  must  have 
been  one  of  those  whom  Christianity  from  the 
first  attracted.  It  is  probable  that  he  passed 
into  the  Christian  Society  from  the  ranks  of 
the  followers  of  the  Baptist.  When  he  writes, 
"  Everyone  that  is  of  the  truth  heareth  My 


\m  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

voice," l  and  "  He  that  doeth  the  truth,  cometh 
to  the  light," 2  he  expresses  the  natural  attrac- 
tion which  led  to  Christianity  all  men  in  whom 
the  spiritual  life  was  strongly  developed.  Sin 
does  not  appear  here  as  a  deep  shadow  thrown 
over  all  life,  but  as  a  perversion  to  which  one 
who  is  born  of  God  is  not  attracted.  In  the 
same  way  the  doctrine  of  election,  which  stands 
out  in  the  Pauline  teaching  with  such  rigid 
severity,  is  greatly  softened,  though  it  is  not 
entirely  abandoned,  in  the  Fourth  Gospel. 
Election  there  is  not  the  work  of  an  arbitrary 
potter,  who  makes  some  vessels  for  honour 
and  some  for  destruction,  but  the  result  of  a 
natural  difference  in  men,  some  of  whom  are 
born  children  of  the  light,  and  some  children 
of  darkness.  "  I  manifested  Thy  name,"  Jesus 
says,3  "  unto  the  men  whom  Thou  gavest  Me 
out  of  the  world ;  Thine  they  were,  and  Thou 
gavest  them  to  Me."  The  words  of  Jesus 
naturally  attracted  to  the  Church  those  who 
had  in  them  the  seeds  of  eternal  life. 

The  first  steps  from  the  threshold  of  religion 
towards  the  spiritual  life  were  accomplished  by 
the  help  of  prayer.  This  also  is  one  of  the 
simplest  and  most  usual  phenomena  of  spiritual 
awakening.  Of  course  the  Evangelist  speaks 
of  prayer,  and  the  way  in  which  he  does  so  is 

1  xviii.  37.  2  iii.  21.  3  xvii.  6. 


THE  BASIS  IN  CHRISTIAN  EXPERIENCE    133 

of  singular  interest.  It  tells  of  a  transition 
through  which  the  Church  was  passing.  We 
must  pass  in  review  the  chief  passages  in  which 
prayer  is  spoken  of.  "  This  is  the  boldness 
which  we  have  toward  Him  (God),  that,  if  we 
ask  anything  according  to  His  will,  He  heareth 
us."1  This  saying  is  in  exactly  the  same  key 
as  the  statements  about  prayer  in  the  Sermon 
on  the  Mount.  "  How  much  more  shall  your 
Father  which  is  in  heaven  give  good  things  to 
them  that  ask  Him  ?  "  But  in  other  passages 
the  special  nature  of  the  prayer  which  is 
Christian,  which  belongs  to  the  Society,  is 
insisted  upon.  "  That  whatsoever  ye  shall 
ask  of  the  Father  in  .My  name,  He  may  give 
it  to  you."2  Still  more  explicit  is  another 
phrase,3  "  Verily,  verily,  I  say  unto  you,  if  ye 
shall  ask  anything  of  the  Father,  He  will  give 
it  you  in  My  name."  It  is  prayer  in  the  name 
of  Christ,  prayer  which  belongs  distinctively  to 
the  Society  which  is  in  constant  communion 
with  Christ,  which  is  sure  of  a  Divine  answer. 
There  is  one  passage  in  the  Gospel  which 
seems  to  be  of  a  somewhat  different  com- 
plexion.4 "  If  ye  shall  ask  Me  anything  in 
My  name,  that  will  I  do."  It  seems  at  first 
sight  that  the  writer  is  here  speaking  of  direct 

1  Epistle  v.  14.  2  xv.  16. 

3  xvi.  23.  4  xiv.  14. 


134  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

prayer  to  Christ.  But,  as  the  Revisers  point 
out,  the  word  me  is  omitted  in  many  ancient 
authorities,  and  the  phrase  "ask  Me  in  My 
name  "  is  obviously  unsatisfactory.  The  only 
prayer  of  which  the  Evangelist  speaks  is 
prayer  to  God  in  the  name  and  in  the  spirit 
of  Christ.  St  Paul  also  does  not  speak  of 
prayer  to  Christ,  but  to  the  Father.  "  I  bow 
my  knees  unto  the  Father  .  .  .  that  Christ 
may  dwell  in  your  hearts  through  faith."1 
Harnack  observes,2  "  As  the  Mediator  and 
High  Priest,  Christ  is,  of  course,  always  and 
everywhere  invoked  by  the  Christians ;  but 
such  invocations  are  one  thing,  and  formal 
prayer  another."  Such  cries  as  that  of  Stephen, 
"  Lord  Jesus,  receive  my  spirit,"  do  not  show 
that  the  custom  which  arose  in  the  second 
century  of  addressing  Christ  in  prayer  was  in 
use  in  the  Apostolic  age. 

Historically  it  is  important  thus  to  trace  the 
gradual  development  in  the  early  Church  of 
prayer  to  Christ,  out  of  prayer  in  the  name 
of  Christ.  But  to  all  who  think  on  the  lines 
of  pragmatism  the  importance  of  the  distinc- 
tion is  not  great.  The  Evangelist  would 
have  held  that  Christian  prayer  was  unique  in 
kind,  but  that  its  wording  was  less  important. 
What  is  important  in  prayer  is  not  the  name 

1   Eph.  iii.   15.  2  History  of  Dogma,  i.  184. 


THE  BASIS  IN  CHRISTIAN  EXPERIENCE    135 

to  which  it  is  addressed,  but  its  spirit  and 
purpose,  whether  it  represents  the  best  feeling 
of  the  Society,  and  whether  it  is  in  accord 
with  trie  Divine  will. 

Not  only  is  the  Christian  Society  united  in 
spirit  with  its  Lord,  but  it  also  derives  thence 
a  power  to  accomplish  mighty  works  in  the 
world.  One  of  the  most  remarkable  passages 
in  the  Gospel  is  that  which  speaks  of  this 
power  as  resting  in  the  Church.  "  He  that 
believeth  on  Me,  the  works  that  I  do  shall  he 
do  also ;  and  greater  works  than  these  shall 
he  do  ;  because  I  go  unto  the  Father."1  And 
again,2  "  The  glory  which  thou  hast  given 
Me  I  have  given  unto  them."  In  another 
chapter  I  shall  have  to  show  that,  with  all 
his  spirituality,  the  Evangelist  does  attach 
great  importance  to  the  miracles  wrought  by 
Jesus,  though  he  is  fond  of  regarding  them 
not  only  in  a  literal  but  also  in  a  symbolic 
way.  And  he  here  plainly  says  that  the 
supernatural  power  which  rested  on  Jesus 
rested  also  on  the  Church,  enabling  its 
Apostles  to  work  signs  and  wonders.  Acts 
records  a  number  of  remarkable  miracles 
wrought  by  St  Peter  and  St  Paul,  miracles  of 
healing,  of  escape  from  prison,  and  the  like, 
which  are  quite  as  striking  as  those  recorded 

1  xiv.  12.  -  xvii.  22. 


136  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

of  Jesus  Himself,  and  which,  like  prayer,  are 
wrought  in  the  name  of  Christ.  We  cannot, 
however,  be  sure  that  Luke's  account  of  these 
wonders  is  accurate. 

But  the  great  miracle  of  all  is  that  which 
is  implied  in  the  very  nature  of  the  Society, 
in  the  character  which  comes  upon  those  who 
join  it,  however  low  the  level  from  which 
they  start.  This  character  is  that  set  forth 
in  one  of  the  most  noteworthy  of  the  sayings 
of  Jesus,  "  Thou  shalt  love  the  Lord  thy  God 
with  all  thy  heart  and  with  all  thy  soul  and 
with  all  thy  mind,"  and  "  Thou  shalt  love  thy 
neighbour  as  thyself."  The  love  of  man  to 
God  is  preached  with  an  energy  and  itera- 
tion which  passes  description  in  the  Hebrew 
Psalms.  The  love  for  man  as  man,  the  "  en- 
thusiasm of  humanity,"  is  the  main  text  of 
the  Synoptic  Gospels,  and  is  set  forth  with 
unsurpassable  force  in  the  tale  of  the  Good 
Samaritan  in  Luke,  and  the  sublime  Vision 
of  Judgment  in  Matthew.  What  is  most 
prominent  in  the  Fourth  Evangelist,  as  in  St 
Paul,  is  a  love  which  lies  between  the  two, 
a  love  for  the  brethren,  an  intense  sense  of 
Christian  charity  or  brotherhood.  "  A  new 
commandment  I  give  unto  you,  that  ye  love 
one  another,  even  as  I  have  loved  you,  that 
ye   also  love   one   another."     The  Epistle   of 


THE  BASIS  IN  CHRISTIAN  EXPERIENCE    137 

the  Evangelist  is,  as  we  all  know,  so  filled 
with  the  expression  of  this  love  that  it  has 
long  passed,  together  with  St  Paul's  hymn 
of  charity,  as  the  highest  expression  of  the 
Christian  spirit.  It  is  to  be  observed  that 
though  the  Evangelist  sometimes  gives  utter- 
ance to  the  wider  enthusiasm  of  humanity,  he 
regards  the  love  of  Christian  for  Christian 
as  something  quite  characteristic  and  unique. 
It  is  primarily  the  bond  of  a  society,  a  bond 
stronger  than  any  tie  of  blood,  of  family,  or  of 
nationality.  It  is,  in  fact,  a  blend  of  love  to 
God  and  love  to  man,  being  inspired  alike 
by  what  is  divine  and  what  is  human  in  the 
Church.  The  Evangelist  sums  up  the  matter 
in  his  usual  way  in  pregnant  phrases,  "  He 
that  loveth  not,  knoweth  not  God,  for  God  is 
love  " ;  "  He  that  abideth  in  love  abideth  in 
God,  and  God  abideth  in  him." 

That  such  love  could  be  felt  for  those  out- 
side the  Society  would  naturally  seem  to  the 
Evangelist  impossible.  The  attitude  of  the 
world  towards  the  Church  is  one  of  hatred  and 
persecution.  And  it  was  only  natural  that  the 
Society  should  dislike  the  world.  "  Love  not 
the  world,  neither  the  things  that  are  in  the 
world.  If  any  man  love  the  world,  the  love  of 
the  Father  is  not  in  him." l    Of  course  I  do  not 

1  Epistle  ii.  15. 


138  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

mean  that  the  Evangelist  preaches  hatred  of 
those  outside  the  Church :  his  character  is  far 
too  sweet  for  that.  In  other  places  he  writes, 
"  God  so  loved  the  world."  He  uses  the  term 
world  (kosmos)  in  a  variety  of  senses  without 
careful  distinction.  But  certainly  he  holds 
that  the  love  of  one  member  of  the  Church  for 
another  must  be  wholly  different  in  character 
from  the  love  of  a  Christian  for  one  outside 
the  community. 

The  fruit  of  repentance,  prayer,  and  love  in 
the  Church  is  eternal  life.  This  phrase  is  so 
fundamental  with  the  Evangelist  that  though 
I  devote  a  later  chapter  to  the  idea,  I  must 
here  say  a  few  words  in  regard  to  it.  The 
meaning  which  the  Evangelist  attaches  to  the 
phrase  shines  out  with  such  luminosity  that  no 
careful  reader  can  miss  it.  It  is  by  partaking 
of  the  Spirit  of  Christ,  doing  the  will  of  God 
as  revealed  in  Jesus  Christ,  becoming  a 
member  of  His  earthly  body,  that  a  man 
attains  to  a  new  birth,  and  thenceforth  lives 
a  life  which  is  eternal,  because  it  has  in  it 
nothing  of  the  fleshly  elements  which  have 
in  them  the  seeds  of  decay  and  death. 

When  he  speaks  of  "  eternal  life,"  the 
Evangelist  moves  altogether  on  Pauline  lines, 
though  he  never  borrows  from  the  writings  of 
St  Paul.     But  there  is  one  notable  difference 


THE  BASIS  IN  CHRISTIAN  EXPERIENCE    139 

between  the  two  writers.     Paul,  as  we  might 
expect  from  his  practical  genius  and  his  mis- 
sionary life,  has  a  far  more  ethical  complexion 
than  the  more  meditative  Evangelist.     Paul  is 
never  tired  of  speaking  of  the  fruits  of  the  Spirit 
as  manifested  in  the  life  of  the  Church,  of  the  up- 
rightness, gentleness,  and  kindness  which  must 
mark  the  members,  alike  in  their  dealings  with 
one  another  and  in  the  relations  with  the  outer 
world.     It  is  true  that  in  his  hymn  of  charity 
he  represents  love  as  the  sum  and  the  root  of  all 
the  Christian  virtues.     But  yet  he  dwells,  as  a 
founder  of  churches  was  bound  to  dwell,  on 
the  necessity  of  conforming  to  the  rules  laid, 
down   by   society  /or    its   own   preservation: 
obedience   to   authority,    a   quiet   and   gentle 
behaviour,  absence  of  a  litigious  spirit.     Actual 
deeds  of  sensuality  done  by  a  Christian,  move 
him  to  such  indignation  that  he  can  scarcely 
find  words  to  express  it.     The  Evangelist  takes 
morality   much    more    for    granted,    for    an 
obvious  corollary  of  the  relation  of  the  Church 
to  Christ.     In  the  Gospel,  perhaps,  he  has  no 
great  opportunity  for  insisting  on  moral  teach- 
ing.    But  in  the   Epistle    also   he   says   very 
little  of  duty  and  of  conduct ;  but  a  great  deal 
about  love.     He  bids  the  converts  "walk  in 
the  light "  ;  and  he  insists  that  "  whosoever  is 
born  of  God  doth  not  commit  sin."     But  he 


140  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

seems  to  think  that  sin  is  almost  inconceivable 
in  one  who  is  a  member  of  Christ.  Herein, 
no  doubt,  he  takes  a  line  too  lofty  for  this 
world  of  ours.  Love  for  the  brethren  may 
easily  lead  to  injustice  to  those  who  are  not 
brethren.  To  be  independent  of  the  rules  of 
morality  is  an  unsafe  position  for  any  man, 
however  spiritual  by  nature.  It  is  strange 
that  the  charge  of  antinomianism,  so  often  un- 
justly brought  against  St  Paul,  should  have 
been  less  often  brought  against  a  follower  who 
more  unguardedly  exposes  himself  to  it.  But, 
after  all,  from  his  own  point  of  view,  the 
writer  is  justified.  It  is  not  the  task  of  an 
inspired  teacher  to  make  a  balanced  scheme  of 
virtues,  or  to  guard  himself  against  misunder- 
standing ;  but  to  say  boldly  what  it  is  given 
him  to  say.  When  he  sums  up  his  teaching 
in  three  words,  "  God  is  love,"  he  utters  a  truth 
so  vast  and  so  difficult,  that  if  all  his  writings 
help  us  but  in  some  measure  to  grasp  it,  they 
will  place  him  among  the  immortals. 


VII 

THE  DOCTRINE  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

The  account  of  the  nature  and  purpose  of  the 
Fourth  Gospel  which  we  find  in  Eusebius1 
characterises  it  better  than  all  the  theories  of 
modern  critics.  He  is  quoting,  or  giving  the 
substance  of,  a  passage  in  the  Outlines  of 
Clement  of  Alexandria,  which  Clement  him- 
self had  derived  from  earlier  authorities. 
"  Last  of  all,"  he  writes,  "  John,  perceiving 
that  the  material  (or  external)  facts  had  been 
set  forth  in  the  (other)  Gospels,  at  the  instance 
of  his  disciples,  and  with  the  inspiration  of 
the  Spirit,  composed  a  spiritual  (pneumatic) 
Gospel."  That  John,  the  son  of  Zebedee,  was 
the  actual  writer  of  the  Gospel  is,  as  we  have 
seen,  if  not  quite  impossible,  at  least  exceed- 
ingly improbable.  But  that  the  author,  who- 
ever he  may  have  been,  was  dissatisfied  with 
the  earlier  Gospels  as  being  too  much  confined 

1   H.E.,  vi.  14,  7. 
141 


142  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

to  the  setting  forth  of  the  mere  audible  words 
and  visible  acts  of  the  Master,  and  as  often 
missing  their  higher  significance,  is  clear.  So, 
as  a  supplement  to  them,  he  wrote  a  Gospel 
which  should  in  some  cases  supply  omissions 
and  correct  errors  of  detail,  but  which  should 
above  all  show  the  true  and  higher  meaning 
of  the  teaching  of  Jesus,  and  the  place  of  His 
life  and  death  in  the  spiritual  sphere.  Com- 
pared with  that  higher  meaning,  the  truth  to 
fact  appeared  to  him  indifferent.  This,  indeed, 
would  be  essentially  the  view  of  all  the  great 
teachers  of  Christianity  at  the  time,  and 
especially  of  those  who  had  a  leaning  towards 
mysticism.  Very  enlightening  is  the  saying 
of  Origen  on  the  subject,  that  the  Fourth 
Evangelist  often  preserved  spiritual  truth  in 
what  might  be  called  material  inaccuracy. 

When  we  come  to  the  question  of  spirit 
(pneuma)  and  the  spiritual,  we  are  obliged  to 
hark  back  for  a  minute  to  the  origin  of  the 
notion  among  the  most  primitive  men.  This 
has  been  set  forth  by  Tylor  in  his  admirable 
Primitive  Culture,  a  work  which  in  its  main 
views  will  scarcely  be  superseded.  The 
primitive  man,  whether  it  be  from  the  ex- 
perience of  the  phenomena  of  trance  and 
dream,  or  from  any  other  source,  acquires  the 
notion  that  to  every  man  visible  in  the  flesh 


THE    DOCTRINE   OF   THE   SPIRIT       143 

there  corresponds  a  semi- material  shadow  or 
ghost,  a  duplicate  of  the  visible  and  active 
human  creature,  who  dwells  in  the  body,  but 
occasionally  leaves  it  in  order  to  roam  about, 
and  who  after  death  often  hovers  about  the 
place  where  he  had  lived,  and  has  relations 
with  his  descendants,  whom  he  helps  in  return 
for  the  offerings  which  they  bring  him.  Out 
of  such  beliefs  grows,  on  one  side,  a  strong 
conviction  of  the  survival  of  death  by  human 
personalities.  This  side  of  the  doctrine  of 
spirit  does  not  concern  us  in  the  present 
chapter ;  we  shall  have  to  return  to  it  when 
treating  of  the  subject  of  eschatological  belief 
in  another  chapter.  But  there  is  a  growth 
on  another  side  of  which  we  must  here  treat. 
With  the  notion  that  all  men  are  ghosts  or 
have  ghosts,  soon  arises  a  general  animistic 
way  of  regarding  the  universe.  Not  only 
men,  but  also  animals  and  plants,  the  forces 
of  nature,  sun,  moon,  and  stars,  are  all  re- 
garded as  having  something  like  a  personality, 
and  being  powerful  for  good  and  evil  in  the 
world.  Over  against  the  visible  and  material 
world  there  is  set  a  realm  of  ghostly  or  spiritual 
being,  which  is  always  reacting  upon  the 
human  world.  This  is  the  root,  the  deep- 
lying  root,  of  the  tree  of  which  all  spiritual 
beliefs  and  philosophies  are  branches. 


144  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

It  is  not  easy  to  say  exactly  what  views  of 
the  nature  of  spirit  were  held  in  Palestine 
and  Greece  at  the  beginning  of  our  era.  No 
doubt  such  views  varied  greatly,  in  proportion 
to  the  education  and  intellectual  tendencies 
of  various  persons.  But  such  refined  notions 
of  spiritual  personality  as  we  find  in  Greek 
philosophers  or  among  well-educated  people 
at  the  present  time  were  not  widespread. 
To  the  notion  of  spirit  there  still  clung  many 
views  which  we  should  regard  as  barbarous. 

It  is,  of  course,  not  exact  to  say  that  the 
Greeks  and  Jews  regarded  spirit  as  material. 
But  they  regarded  it  as  having  some  qualities 
which  we  might  consider  material.  Pneuma 
is  properly  breath  or  wind ;  and  spirits  were 
regarded  as  having  some  likeness  to  breath 
or  air.  Besides  the  spirit,  the  breath  of  life, 
which  each  man  received  at  birth,  he  might 
at  any  time  be  invaded  by  a  pneuma  from 
without,  which  came  into  the  body.  It  might 
be  a  good  spirit  or  a  bad  one ;  but  in  either 
case  it  acted  strongly  in  the  body  of  which  it 
thus  took  possession.  If  the  pneuma  were 
bad,  it  was  necessary  to  exorcise  it  and  cast  it 
out.  If  it  were  good,  it  might  bring  into  a  man 
a  new  nature,  make  him  capable  of  powers 
and  virtues  which  he  did  not  before  possess, 
unite  him  in  spirit  with  the  higher  Powers. 


THE   DOCTRINE   OF  THE   SPIRIT       145 

In  the  Old  Testament  we  read  of  lying 
spirits  as  entering  into  false  prophets,  so  that 
they  led  men  on  to  their  destruction.  And 
we  read  of  a  Divine  Spirit,  the  entry  of  which 
into  a  man  gives  him  superhuman  strength 
or  wisdom.  When  the  Divine  Spirit  came 
upon  Samson,  it  made  him  so  strong  that  he 
could  break  ropes  as  if  they  were  burnt  flax. 
It  was  by  the  Divine  Spirit  that  Bezalel,  the 
son  of  Uri,1  had  wisdom  to  plan  all  manner  of 
cunning  work  in  gold  and  silver  and  stone. 
In  this  possession  by  the  Spirit  there  is 
nothing  ethical ;  it  is  an  added  power  and 
raising  of  a  man's  faculties.  But  in  the  later 
times  of  Israel,  when  we  come  to  the  great 
prophets  and  the  Psalms,  the  idea  of  inspira- 
tion by  the  Divine  Spirit,  though  it  might  still 
be  thought  of  as  almost  physical  in  character, 
was  yet  immensely  raised  and  moralised. 

In  the  Fourth  Gospel  we  find  something 
both  of  the  popular  and  of  the  philosophic 
view  when  the  word  spirit  is  used.  While 
the  Evangelist  appreciates  and  adopts  the 
Platonic  view  of  spirit,  he  yet  evidently 
regards  its  transmission  from  man  to  man,  or 
from  God  to  man,  as  in  a  measure  physical, 
or  at  least  as  accomplished  by  some  kind 
of  physical  contact.      Here,  as  elsewhere,  he 

1  Exodus  xxxv.  30. 

10 


146  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

fluctuates  between  the  pure  spirituality  which 
sometimes  attracts  him,  and  the  materialism 
which  he  feels  to  be  necessary  to  the  exist- 
ence of  the  Church  in  the  visible  world. 

The  word  spirit  does  not  occur  in  our 
Gospel  so  frequently  as  in  the  writings  of  St 
Paul  and  even  St  Luke,  but  the  idea  occupies 
a  larger  place  in  the  mind  and  heart  of  the 
Evangelist  than  it  does  in  those  of  any  New 
Testament  writer.  He  uses  the  word  in  three 
senses,  which  cannot  in  all  passages  be  clearly 
distinguished,  but  which  are  at  bottom  very 
different. 

Firstly,  he  uses  it  in  a  broad  and  cosmic 
sense.  He  is  ever  contrasting  that  which  is 
visible  and  tangible  with  that  which  is  in- 
visible and  eternal.  To  him  tKe  world  is  but 
a  manifestation  in  time  and  place  of  the 
spiritual  realities  which  lie  above  and  behind 
it.  The  spirit  and  the  flesh  are  contrasted, 
and  at  enmity  one  with  another.  Each  has 
its  own  way  of  propagation :  "  That  which  is 
born  of  the  flesh  is  flesh,  and  that  which  is 
born  of  the  spirit  is  spirit."  The  matter  is 
summed  up  in  a  single  sublime  phrase,  which 
unfortunately  has  been  the  origin  of  many  a 
metaphysical  cobweb  :  "  God  is  spirit."  It  is 
unfortunate  that  the  English  version  translates 
the  phrase,  God  is  a  Spirit,  which  spoils  the 


THE    DOCTRINE   OF   THE   SPIRIT       147 

sense.1  God,  the  Evangelist  insists,  is  not  the 
God  of  the  Jews,  nor  of  the  Samaritans  ;  but 
wherever  men  worship  in  spirit  and  loyalty, 
there  God  is  present ;  and  such  worship  is 
grateful  to  Him.  It  is  spirit  which  is  the 
source  of  life,  he  adds  in  another  place,2  and 
flesh  is  of  no  avail. 

This  way  of  regarding  the  world  is  that 
common  to  all  the  Platonic  schools.  Whence 
the  doctrine  came  to  Plato  is  uncertain  :  some 
think  that  it  belongs  to  his  master  Socrates ; 
some  that  he  took  it  from  the  Oriental  mystery 
religions ;  some  that  it  follows  the  lines  of 
early  Ionian  thought.  In  any  case,  he  made  it 
his  own ;  and  from  his  day  to  ours  the  view 
that  the  spiritual  is  "the  real  and  abiding,  and 
the  material  the  evanescent  and  phantasmal, 
has  been  the  creed  of  most  of  the  great 
teachers  of  mankind.  The  Founder  of  Christi- 
anity held  the  view  implicitly ;  to  Him  God 
and  the  spirit  of  man  were  the  great  realities, 
in  comparison  with  which  nothing  mattered  ; 
but  He  did  not  deal  with  abstract  thought, 
and  never  set  out  His  cosmology  in  philosophic 
form.     In  the  letters  of  St  Paul  the  same  way 

1  The  phrase  is  parallel  to  that  in  the  first  verse  of  the 
Gospel :  "  The  Word  was  God."  Here  the  English  version 
does  not  read  "The  Word  was  a  god."  I  discuss  this 
phrase  more  fully  below. 

2  vi.  63. 


148  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

of  regarding  the  universe  is  underlying,  and 
often  expressed,  as  in  the  phrase,  "  We  look 
not  at  the  things  which  are  seen,  but  at  the 
things  which  are  not  seen :  for  the  things 
which  are  seen  are  temporal ;  but  the  things 
which  are  not  seen  are  eternal."  But  St  Paul 
was  above  all  things  a  man  of  action ;  and 
he  does  not  attempt  to  construct  a  detailed 
system.  The  Fourth  Evangelist  is  more  con- 
templative, and  it  is  he  who  especially  brought 
into  the  thought  of  the  nascent  Church  the 
great  ideas  of  the  Platonic  philosophy. 

Secondly,  the  Evangelist  uses  the  word 
spirit  in  speaking  of  the  experience  of  the 
Church.  No  sooner  had  Jesus  departed,  so 
far  as  bodily  presence  went,  from  the  disciples, 
than  they  felt  among  them  a  continued 
spiritual  power  inspiring  and  guiding  them. 
It  was  a  new  experience  in  the  world  ;  and 
the  Society  did  not  hesitate  to  see  and  feel 
in  it  a  continuation  of  the  spiritual  life  of 
its  Founder.  In  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount, 
Jesus  speaks  of  the  Father  as  giving  the  Holy 
Spirit  to  those  who  ask  Him.  This  certainly 
seems  like  the  original  teaching  of  Christianity. 
It  is,  in  fact,  that  of  the  fifty-first  Psalm :  "  Cast 
me  not  away  from  Thy  presence,  and  take  not 
Thy  Holy  Spirit  from  me."  In  another  passage, 
in   Matthew,  we  may  discern  the  impress   of 


THE   DOCTRINE    OF  THE    SPIRIT       149 

a  later  time.  The  Saviour  speaks  of  the  per- 
secutions of  His  followers,  and  bids  them, 
when  they  are  summoned  before  the  tribunals, 
to  take  no  anxious  thought  as  to  what  their 
answer  shall  be :  "It  shall  be  given  you  in 
that  hour  what  ye  shall  speak.  For  it  is  not 
ye  that  speak,  but  the  Spirit  of  your  Father 
that  speaketh  in  you.1'1  As  the  disciples  were 
not  prosecuted  by  authority  in  the  lifetime 
of  Jesus,  this  passage  seems  to  belong  to  the 
time  after  the  Crucifixion.  Matthew  does 
not  add,  as  the  Fourth  Evangelist  does  on  a 
similar  occasion,  that  this  must  refer  to  the 
future :  "  for  the  Spirit  was  not  yet  given ; 
because  Jesus  was  not  yet  glorified."2  But 
we  may  best  regard  it  as  a  gleam  reflected 
back  into  the  life  of  Jesus  from  the  early 
Christian  consciousness. 

According  to  Luke,  St  Paul,  and  other 
writers  of  the  New  Testament,  Scripture  was 
revealed  to  the  great  teachers  of  Israel  by 
the  Holy  Spirit.  But  in  the  early  Christian 
Church  there  was  an  outpouring  of  the  Divine 
Spirit,  such  as  the  world  had  never  known. 
Wherever  the  Apostles  and  missionaries  went, 
they  found  a  Spirit  working  not  only  within 
them,  but  for  them,  removing  obstacles,  pre- 
paring  the  hearts  of  men  to    believe,  giving 

1  Matt.  x.  20.  2  John  vii.  39. 


150  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

peace  and  joy  to  all  who  accepted  the  faith 
of  Christ.  The  Spirit  worked  in  the  Society 
in  its  assemblies,  and  in  the  hearts  of  indi- 
viduals, inspiring,  giving  courage  and  wisdom, 
leading  in  the  way  of  righteousness  and  faith. 
The  great  and  life-giving  impulses  which 
come  from  time  to  time  from  God  for  the 
remoulding  and  raising  of  mankind  take  many 
outward  forms,1  and  each  leader  of  men  looks 
at  them  in  a  somewhat  different  way.  So 
we  are  not  surprised  to  find  that  the  various 
writers  of  the  New  Testament  emphasise 
different  sides  of  the  inspiration  of  the  Church. 
On  Luke,  who,  in  spite  of  his  splendid  charity, 
is  somewhat  materialist,  the  inspiration  makes 
most  impression  in  its  outward  and  physical 
forms ;  to  him  it  is  the  energy  in  virtue  of 
which  the  Apostles  heal  the  sick,  and  the 
disciples  speak  with  tongues  and  exercise  the 
super-physical  powers  displayed  in  the  charis- 
mata. The  phenomena  on  which  he  dwells  are 
closely  similar  to  those  familiar  to  us  in  recent 
times  in  connection  with  faith-healing  and 
evangelical  revival  meetings.  By  the  Spirit 
the  Apostles  receive  the  gift  of  tongues  which 
enables  them  in  a  day  to  convert  three 
thousand  hearers.     By  it   Ananias  and   Sap- 

1  Exploratio    Evangelica,    ch.    vii.  :    "  The   Inspiration  of 
History." 


THE   DOCTRINE   OF   THE   SPIRIT       151 

phira  are  struck  dead,  Elymas  the  Sorcerer 
is  smitten  with  blindness,  Paul  and  Silas 
escape  from  prison,  Paul  receives  frequent 
directions  as  to  the  course  of  his  journeys, 
and  so  forth.  Luke  of  course  also  dwells  on 
the  higher  manifestations  of  the  Spirit,  in 
preaching,  in  power  to  bear  persecution,  in 
peace  and  joy  in  believing.  It  is  notable 
that  he  always  speaks  of  the  source  of  the 
Christian  energy  as  the  Holy  Spirit,  though 
the  wonders  are  sometimes  spoken  of  as 
done  in  the  name  of  Christ. 

St  Luke  also  consistently  makes  the  trans- 
mission of  the  Spirit  a  result  of  physical 
contact.  It  is  by  the  laying  on  of  the 
Apostle's  hands  that  the  Holy  Spirit  as  a 
quasi-material  essence  is  given  to  the  converts. 
Simon  Magus  thinks  that  this  is  done  by  some 
secret  of  magic,  and  is  anxious  to  purchase 
the  power.  Originally,  however,  the  power  of 
the  Spirit  did  not  come  among  the  Apostles 
by  the  imposition  of  the  hands  of  their  Master, 
but  at  the  Pentecostal  season  through  flames 
of  fire  which  descended  and  rested  upon  each 
of  them,  when  at  once  they  began  to  speak 
with  tongues  and  to  manifest  the  outward 
signs  of  the  inward  possession  by  the  Spirit. 
This  seems  to  be  the  accepted  view  in  the 
early  Church.     The  Fourth  Evangelist,  how- 


152  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

ever,  has  a  view  of  his  own  as  to  the  original 
inspiration  of  the  disciples.  "  On  the  first 
day  of  the  week,  and  when  the  doors  were 
shut  where  the  disciples  were,  for  fear  of  the 
Jews,  Jesus  came  and  stood  in  the  midst,  .  .  . 
and  He  breathed  on  them,  and  saith  unto 
them,  Receive  ye  the  Holy  Spirit."1  Thus, 
in  his  view,  the  Spirit  was  directly  imparted 
by  the  risen  Lord  to  His  disciples  as  a  wind 
or  breath.  The  direct  contradiction  between 
this  account  and  that  in  Acts  is  commonly 
passed  over  by  Christians  ;  but  it  is  necessary 
to  say  that  from  the  historical  point  of  view 
the  two  accounts  are  not  to  be  reconciled. 
Another  point  is  that  in  Acts  it  would  seem 
from  the  context  that  it  was  the  twelve 
Apostles  only  who  received  the  gift  of  the 
Spirit ;  and  the  multitude  who  were  gathered 
into  the  Church  on  the  day  of  Pentecost 
were  baptised  indeed,  but  not  confirmed  by 
the  imposition  of  hands.  According  to  the 
Evangelist  it  was  the  whole  body  of  the 
disciples,  including  apparently  some  women, 
who  received  the  gift  directly  from  their 
Master. 

To  Jesus  Himself  the  Spirit  had  come  in 
the  form  of  a  dove,  to  abide  with  Him.  He 
imparts  it  to   His   disciples  by  breath.     But 

1  John  xx.  19-22. 


THE    DOCTRINE    OF  THE    SPIRIT       153 

these  external  and  visible  works  of  the  Spirit 
are  quite  eclipsed  by  the  teaching  in  the  last 
chapters  of  the  Gospel  as  to  the  coming  of  the 
Holy  Spirit  to  the  Church,  to  be  its  life  and 
its  light.  This  teaching  is  essentially  Pauline, 
though  the  words  used  are  not  St  Paul's. 

St  Paul  does  not  speak  of  the  Spirit  in  the 
same  way  as  the  writer  of  Acts.  He  speaks 
of  the  charismata  as  the  gifts  of  the  Spirit, 
though  he  does  not  value  the  mere  outward 
manifestations  of  speaking  with  tongues  and 
healing  so  highly  as  does  Luke.  It  is  with 
far  greater  force  and  enthusiasm  that  he  com- 
mends the  more  inward  gifts  of  the  Spirit. 
It  is  by  gift  of  the, Spirit,  he  says,  that  one 
man  has  the  word  of  wisdom,  another  faith, 
another  the  power  to  work  miracles.  But  the 
working  of  the  Spirit  is  best  shown  by  the 
blossoming  of  Christian  graces.1  "  The  fruit 
of  the  Spirit  is  love,  joy,  peace,  long-suffering, 
kindness,  goodness,  faithfulness,  meekness, 
temperance."  This,  however,  is  by  no  means 
the  whole  of  the  Pauline  doctrine.  All  the 
fruits  of  the  Spirit  come  from  one  source  only  : 
the  life  of  Christ  in  the  soul.  "  They  that  are 
of  Christ  Jesus  have  crucified  the  flesh  with 
the  passions  and  the  lusts  thereof."  To  them 
sin  has  become  a  thing  against  nature.     The 

1   Gal.  v.  22. 


154  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

doctrine  of  the  indwelling  Christ  is  the  teach- 
ing which  is  with  Paul  most  fundamental. 
He  is  never  tired  of  reverting  to  it.  Not  only 
does  Christ  dwell  within  the  believer,  but  in 
the  end  the  believer's  self  disappears,  his  life  is 
hidden  with  Christ  in  God.  Every  Christian 
is  part  of  the  earthly  body  of  Christ,  and 
carries  on  in  the  world  the  obedience  of 
Christ.  And  Paul  makes  no  attempt  to 
reconcile  what  seem  to  a  mere  prosaic  critic 
the  two  different  views  of  the  source  of  the 
Christian  enthusiasm.  Modern  commentators 
are  much  exercised  to  reconcile  these  views ; 
but  St  Paul  was  a  pragmatist  and  cared 
very  little  for  verbal  contradictions.  To  him, 
Christ,  the  Spirit  of  Christ,  the  Divine  Spirit, 
are  only  varied  ways  of  expressing  the  same 
experiences  and  the  same  facts.  It  is,  in  fact, 
very  doubtful  whether  St  Paul  himself  ever 
used  the  rite  of  laying  on  of  hands.  The 
author  of  Acts  says  that  he  did  so  on  various 
occasions,1  and  one  of  these  occasions  is 
mentioned  in  the  xve  narrative.  But  since 
St  Paul  does  not  mention  the  rite  in  his 
genuine  letters,2  we  may  conclude  that  at  all 
events  he  did  not  very  highly  value  it. 

The  Fourth  Evangelist  takes  a  line  which 
is  his  own,  not  identical  either  with  that  of 

1  Acts  xix.  6;  xxviii.  8.  -  Compare  1  Tim.  iv.  14. 


THE    DOCTRINE    OF   THE   SPIRIT       155 

Luke  or  with  that  of  Paul.  That  he  really 
accepts  the  Pauline  identification  appears 
clearly  from  two  passages,  one  in  his  Gospel 
and  one  in  his  Epistle.  In  his  Gospel  (xiv.  23) 
he  puts  into  the  mouth  of  Jesus  the  words, 
"  If  a  man  love  Me,  he  will  keep  My  word : 
and  my  Father  will  love  him,  and  we  will 
come  unto  him,  and  make  our  abode  with 
him."  And  in  the  Epistle  he  writes  (iv.  13), 
"  Hereby  know  we  that  we  abide  in  Him 
and  He  in  us,  because  He  hath  given  us  of 
His  Spirit."  And  even  more  clearly,  in  the 
wonderful  parable  of  the  vine  and  the  branches, 
he  teaches  exactly  the  same  doctrine  of  the 
indwelling  Christ,  which  St  Paul  teaches  in 
his  similitude  of  the  head  and  the  members. 
To  him,  as  to  Paul,  every  Christian  is  a  part 
of  the  life  of  Christ. 

But  the  Evangelist  is  more  contemplative, 
more  thoughtful,  than  St  Paul,  and  we  should 
expect  him  to  take  more  pains  to  clarify  his 
thought.  He  does  so  by  accepting  on  the 
whole  what  seems  to  have  been  the  usual 
teaching  of  the  nascent  Church.  But  he  pre- 
sents it  to  us  in  a  different  aspect  from  that 
which  it  bears  in  Luke.  He  does  not  dwell 
on  the  outward  marks  of  the  Spirit,  the  charis- 
mata. But  in  several  passages  he  speaks  of 
the  communion   between    man  and   God,  by 


156  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

means  of  the  Spirit,  as  a  higher  revelation  than 
that  which  resulted  from  the  bodily  presence 
of  the  Saviour.  In  vii.  38  he  represents  Jesus 
as  saying  that  the  result  to  believers  on  Him- 
self shall  be  a  springing  of  living  water  within  ; 
and  he  adds,  "  This  spake  He  of  the  Spirit  which 
they  that  believed  on  Him  were  to  receive." 
And  in  the  great  speech  of  farewell  which 
occupies  chapters  xiv.  to  xvii.,  the  same  thought 
recurs :  "I  will  pray  the  Father,  and  He  shall 
give  you  another  Helper,  that  He  may  be  with 
you  for  ever,  even  the  Spirit  of  truth  ;  ...  He 
abideth  with  you,  and  shall  be  in  you."1  But 
the  Evangelist  guards  himself  against  any 
misconception  to  the  effect  that  the  Spirit 
would  supersede  the  Master's*  own  presence, 
by  adding,  "  I  will  not  leave  you  desolate :  I 
come  unto  you ;  .  .  .  because  I  live  ye  shall 
live  also."  A  little  later,  in  the  manner  of 
most  great  teachers,  who  put  forth  first  one  side 
of  a  truth  strongly,  and  then  the  reverse  side, 
he  reverts  to  his  doctrine  of  the  Paraclete : 2 
"  It  is  expedient  for  you  that  I  go  away,  for 
if  I  go  not  away,  the  Helper  will  not  come 
unto  you ;  but  if  I  go  I  will  send  Him  unto 
you."  Here  the  real  thought  in  the  mind  of 
the  writer  is  clearly  that  the  presence  of  the 
spiritual  and  indwelling  Christ  is  really  better 
1  xiv.  16.  2  xvi.  7. 


THE    DOCTRINE   OF   THE   SPIRIT       157 

for  the  Church  than  the  bodily  presence  of  the 
Master.  And  he  puts  the  same  thought  into 
another  form  later  (xx.  29):  "Because  thou  hast 
seen  Me  thou  hast  believed  :  blessed  are  they 
that  have  not  seen,  and  yet  have  believed." 

At  the  same  time  we  must  observe  that 
this  close  identification  of  the  Paraclete  with 
the  exalted  Christ,  naturally  leading  to  speak- 
ing of  Him  in  the  language  of  personality,  had 
an  effect  in  preparing  men's  minds  for  the 
reception  of  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  as 
later  formulated  in  the  Church.  Elsewhere 
in  the  Gospels  and  the  Acts  the  Holy  Spirit 
is  spoken  of  rather  as  a  spiritual  influence. 
And  even  in  the  Fourth  Gospel,  in  other 
passages,  this  is  notably  the  case.  John  the 
Baptist  is  represented1  as  saying  that  Jesus 
baptised  with  the  Holy  Spirit.  And  when, 
after  the  resurrection,  Christ  appeared  to  the 
disciples  assembled  together,  He  said  to  them, 
"  Receive  ye  the  Holy  Spirit."2 

Some  of  the  utterances  of  the  Evangelist  in 
regard  to  the  Spirit  are  strongly  characteristic 
of  his  point  of  view.  It  is  notable  how  closely 
he  connects  the  working  of  the  Spirit  with 
truth.  In  some  places3  he  uses  the  phrase, 
Spirit  of  truth,  and  in  one  he  writes,*  "  He 

1  John  i.  33.  '2  xx.  22. 

3  xiv.  17;  xv.  26.  4  xvi.  13. 


158  THE    EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

(the  Spirit)  will  guide  you  into  all  truth." 
These  words  require  some  comment ;  and  it  is 
to  be  feared  that  in  the  history  of  Christianity, 
and  especially  in  its  quite  modern  history, 
they  have  given  rise  to  serious  misunderstand- 
ings. This  subject,  however,  must  be  reserved 
for  a  future  chapter. 

I  think  that  when  some  modern  critics 
maintain  that  in  this  Gospel  the  Spirit  works 
not  by  charismata  or  gifts,  as  in  the  Pauline 
Epistles,  but  largely  in  the  field  of  intellect, 
they  go  much  too  far.  In  the  Pauline  Epistles 
and  in  the  Gospel  alike,  the  place  of  intellect 
is  a  very  restricted  one.  In  the  introductory 
verses  of  the  Gospel  there  is  some  attempt  to 
sketch  a  system.  But  in  the  bbdy  of  the  work 
there  is  little  of  philosophic  system.  By  one 
metaphor  after  another,  by  signs  and  wonders 
and  by  speeches,  the  author  tries  to  set  forth 
in  manifold  ways  what  the  indwelling  Christ 
was  to  the  Church.  This  idea  had  so  com- 
pletely occupied  and  filled  his  mind,  that 
all  the  traditions  which  came  to  him  from 
the  Apostles  of  actual  deeds  and  words 
of  the  Master  were  fused  into  new  shapes, 
and  built  into  the  fabric  of  a  great  spiritual 
edifice. 

What  has  been  said  as  to  truth  applies  also 
to  the  other  expression,  light.     The  light  that 


THE    DOCTRINE   OF   THE   SPIRIT       159 

lights  every  man  who  comes  into  the  world, 
the  light  which  attracts  all  those  who  are  born 
of  God  and  whose  deeds  are  good,  is  also  a  gift 
of  the  Spirit  of  God,  and  is  no  mere  intellectual 
illumination.  It  does  indeed  enlighten  the 
mind,  but  it  is  from  within,  by  a  spiritual  in- 
fluence, not  by  mere  collocation  of  fact  and 
piling  up  of  reasoning.  As  Jesus  Christ  is  the 
life  and  the  way,  so  also  He  is  the  light  of  the 
world.  In  Matthew,  Jesus  says  to  the  disciples, 
"Ye  are  the  light  of  the  world."  After  all, 
there  is  no  contradiction  between  the  two  ex- 
pressions. It  was  the  Christ  indwelling  in  the 
Church,  and  shining  in  the  deeds  of  Christians, 
who  was  the  light  of  the  world  in  those  days 
of  the  early  Christian  enthusiasm. 

Mr  Scott  has  maintained  that  the  doctrine 
of  the  Spirit  in  the  Fourth  Gospel  is  super- 
fluous : x  "  The  more  closely  we  examine  the 
Johannine  doctrine  of  the  Spirit,  the  more  we 
are  compelled  to  acknowledge  that  there  is 
no  place  for  it  in  the  theology  as  a  whole." 
Mr  Scott  has  been  attacked  for  this  saying ; 
but  I  think  that  it  is  quite  true.  In  fact,  I 
would  go  further,  and  say  that,  if  we  except 
the  Synoptic  Gospels  and  Acts,  the  Spirit  of 
God  and  the  Spirit  of  Christ  in  the  Church  are 
closely  identified.     In  studying  the  Epistles  of 

1    The  Fourth  Gospel,  p.  347. 


160  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

St  Paul  this  came  out  clearly  in  my  mind ; l 
but  I  did  not  then  realise  that  what  applied 
to  Paul  applied  also  to  the  Fourth  Evangelist. 
Of  course,  as  the  Evangelist  is  professedly 
writing  a  life  of  Jesus  on  earth,  he  cannot  use 
the  phrase  "  Jesus  Christ "  in  the  way  in  which 
St  Paul  uses  it.  But  the  fundamental  belief 
of  the  two  writers  is  the  same.  Even  when 
the  Evangelist  speaks  of  the  Cosmic  Spirit,  he 
identifies  that  Spirit  with  the  revelation  in  the 
flesh  by  Jesus,  just  as  St  Paul  writes  that  it 
was  through  Christ  that  God  made  the  cosmos. 
In  the  third  place,  I  must  add  a  few  words 
as  to  the  mentions  in  the  Gospel  of  lesser 
spirits,  good  and  evil.  The  Evangelist  would 
naturally  and  necessarily  share,*  to  some  extent, 
the  opinions  universal  among  his  contempor- 
aries as  to  the  agency  of  spirits  in  the  human 
world.  But  he  left  the  speaking  of  them  to 
others :  more  important  subjects  claimed  his 
pen.  Angels  of  light  are  only  spoken  of  in  a 
distinctive  way  in  one  passage  (xx.  12),  where 
it  is  related  that  when  Mary  Magdalene  looked 
into  the  tomb  she  beheld  "  two  angels  in  white 
sitting,  one  at  the  head,  and  one  at  the  feet, 
where  the  body  of  Jesus  had  lain."  Like 
many  of  the  details  in  the  Johannine  account 
of  the  last  days,  this  narrative  has  all  the  air 

1   The  Religious  Experience  of  St  Paul,  p.  259. 


THE   DOCTRINE   OF  THE   SPIRIT       161 

of  having  come  down  in  tradition.  Mary- 
Magdalene,  out  of  whom  Jesus  had  cast  seven 
devils,  was  quite  the  sort  of  sensitive  person 
who  might  see  a  vision  of  angels,  and  would 
see  them  in  the  forms  conventional  at  the  time. 

It  is  well  known  that  the  Evangelist  passes 
by  those  tales  of  the  exorcism  of  evil  spirits 
which  take  so  large  a  place  among  the 
miracles  of  healing  recorded  by  the  Synoptist 
writers.  There  is,  however,  a  passage  in  his 
Epistle  in  which  he  addresses  to  the  Church  a 
warning :  "  Believe  not  every  spirit,  but  prove 
the  spirits,  whether  they  are  of  God."  This 
advice  is  strictly  practical.  As  everyone 
knows,  in  times  and  places  where  a  spiritual 
afflatus  is  poured  out  on  Christian  assemblies, 
the  results  are  never  entirely  good.  Demons 
imitate  the  angels  of  light.  Imposture  and 
greed  find  occasion  to  ape  spiritual  exaltation. 
But  the  language  of  the  writer  is  noteworthy 
for  its  gentleness.  He  does  not  speak  harshly 
of  evil  spirits  ;  he  merely  says  that  they  are  not 
of  God,  to  be  avoided  rather  than  combated. 

But  though  the  feeling  of  the  Evangelist  in 

regard  to  demons  is  for  the  time  wonderfully 

gentle  and  enlightened,  he  has  a  distinct  belief 

in  a  great  power  of  evil  in  the  world,  as  the 

enemy  of  all  that  is  Christian  and  all  that  is 

good.     If  he  somewhat  disdains   evil   sprites, 

11 


162  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

he  is  quite  alive  to  the  power  of  the  principle 
of  darkness  and  wickedness.  And  it  is  quite 
in  character  that  the  great  condemnation 
which  he  utters  against  this  power,  Satan,  is 
that  he  is  in  continual  opposition  to  the  truth : 
"  He  is  a  liar,  and  the  father  of  lying."  He  is 
also  spoken  of  as  in  his  essence  (or  from  the 
beginning)  a  murderer.  But  it  is  on  the  first 
of  these  condemnations  that  he  most  insists. 
As  the  whole  Gospel  presents  itself  to  his  mind 
as  truth,  and  the  whole  work  of  the  Spirit  as 
the  publishing  of  truth,  so  the  great  enemy 
of  mankind  seems  to  him  an  enemy  of  the 
truth.  It  is  to  be  noted  that  the  writer  of 
the  Apocalypse,  in  most  respects  so  different 
from  the  Evangelist,  has  on  this  point  a  co- 
incidence with  him.  Among  those  who  are 
shut  out  by  the  gates  of  the  New  Jerusalem, 
among  sorcerers,  and  impure,  and  murderers, 
and  idolaters,  are  especially  mentioned  those 
who  love  and  utter  lies. 


VIII 
ESCHATOLOGY:   ETERNAL   LIFE 

It  is  now  generally  recognised  that  the  pro- 
blems and  beliefs  connected  with  eschatology 
lie  at  the  foundation  of  the  teaching  of  early 
Christianity,  and  indeed  of  all  Christianity 
down  to  our  own  days.  Every  man  finds 
himself  a  member  of  a  community,  a  human 
being  of  mixed  tendencies,  born  into  a  world 
where  good  and  evil,  happiness  and  misery, 
the  material  and  the  spiritual,  are  strangely 
mixed  together.  Every  man  who  reflects 
finds  an  infinite  number  of  problems  of  a 
moral,  intellectual,  and  spiritual  order  lying 
about  him ;  and  before  he  can  be  at  peace  or 
find  his  place  in  the  vast  scheme  of  creation 
he  has  to  take  up  an  attitude,  to  find  some 
way  of  relating  his  own  existence,  his  con- 
sciousness and  will,  to  the  immense  series  of 
external  conditions  and  forces. 

The  three  great   questions    of  eschatology 

163 


164  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

are  :  ( 1 )  What  is  the  meaning  and  purpose  of 
the  world  ?  Why  does  it  exist,  and  whither  is 
it  tending  ?  How  can  the  individual  fall  into 
line  to  help  the  wTorld  to  attain  the  ends  to 
which  it  seems  to  be  moving,  and  to  remove 
the  forces  of  evil  which  hem  it  in  and  hinder 
it  on  every  side.  (2)  What  is  the  meaning 
and  purpose  of  individual  existence  ?  Why 
was  I  born,  and  whither  am  I  going?  This 
consciousness  of  mine — an  absolutely  unique 
thing  to  me,  as  to  all  others  in  their  own 
existence, — will  it  cease  at  death,  or  is  it 
destined  for  a  new  life  under  fresh  conditions  ? 
(3)  I  am  conscious  of  belonging  at  once  to 
two  worlds — the  world  that  is  seen,  the 
material  universe,  and  the  world  which  is  not 
seen,  the  realm  of  the  spirit.  Which  is  the 
more  important?  Which  am  I  to  try  to 
subordinate  to  the  other  ? 

These  three  questions  have  perplexed  man- 
kind since  man  became  human.  All  through 
history,  their  incidence  has  grown  stronger 
and  stronger.  The  great  and  inspired  men 
who  have  arisen  at  all  times  and  among  all 
peoples  have  tried  to  furnish  solutions  to  one 
or  another  of  them,  sometimes  to  all  of  them. 
Hence  arise  religions.  The  great  religions  of 
the  world  may  be  most  readily  classified  by 
the  attitude  which  they  take  up  in  regard  to 


ESCHATOLOGY:    ETERNAL   LIFE       165 

these  questions.  But  of  course  this  is  no 
place  for  such  classifications.  We  can  here 
only  consider  these  questions  as  far  as  they 
refer  to  the  beginnings  of  Christianity. 

And  although  it  is  necessary  to  set  out 
clearly  the  differences  of  these  questions,  yet 
it  would  of  course  be  quite  absurd  to  imagine 
that  they  have  been  kept  apart  in  the  history 
of  the  human  mind.  Each  religion  must  have 
some  teaching  in  regard  to  all  of  them.  But 
different  religions  commonly  put  one  or  other 
of  them  in  the  foreground  and  regard  the 
others  as  subordinate.  Nor  could  we  expect 
that  any  religious  teacher,  or  any  settled 
religion,  would  wholly  avoid  inconsistencies 
and  contradictions  in  the  solutions  proposed. 
The  progress  of  religious  belief  is  not  a  logical 
process,  but  a  biological.  Thought  comes  after 
experience  and  belief,  and  only  registers  and 
tries  to  co-ordinate  the  results  of  feeling  and 
aspiration.  Men  live ;  and  thought  is  little 
more  than  a  by-product  of  life.  And,  life 
being  continuous,  there  must  always  be  in 
the  intellectual  systems  of  belief  a  great  deal 
of  survival — a  survival  of  ways  of  feeling 
and  living  which  really  go  with  an  intellectual 
outlook  which  has  passed  away.  Thought 
really  follows  life  at  a  distance,  collects  the 
traces  which  it  has  left,  and  tries  to  produce 


166  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

from  them  some  not  too  inconsistent  view  of 
the  world. 

Of  course  those  who  think  that  Christianity 
came  into  the  world  full-grown  and  complete  ; 
that  the  Bible  or  the  New  Testament  is  the 
direct  word  of  God,  and  contains  the  solution 
of  all  difficulties,  intellectual  and  moral,  must 
be  left  to  their  belief.  But  those  who  under- 
stand that  religion  in  all  ages  is  a  growing 
plant,  nurtured  by  the  hand  of  God,  but 
drawing  sustenance  from  the  earth  and  the 
air  which  surround  it,  drawing  its  principle  of 
life  from  above,  but  subject  to  material  and 
human  conditions,  must  realise  that  of  Chris- 
tianity, as  of  all  religions,  we  can  never  have 
a  complete  and  final  presentation,  but  only 
tendencies  and  approximations.  In  the  New 
Testament  itself  we  have  many  very  different 
conceptions  of  what  Christianity  really  is,  of 
the  relations  of  the  individual  to  the  Church, 
of  the  Church  to  its  invisible  Head,  of  the 
world  to  its  Creator.  And  in  no  province  is 
there  more  variety  of  view  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment than  in  the  province  of  eschatology. 
Nor  in  any  other  province  is  there  more  of 
incompleteness.  We  have  hints  and  hopes 
and  aspirations ;  but  nothing  even  approach- 
ing dogmatic  teaching. 

Early  Christian  views  as  to  question  (1),  the 


ESCHATOLOGY:    ETERNAL  LIFE       167 

destiny  of  the  world,  were  mainly  taken  over 
from  Judaism  ;  views  as  to  question  (2),  the 
destiny  of  the  individual,  were  mainly  derived 
from  "contemporary  Pagan  thought ;  views  as 
to  question  (3),  the  relations  of  the  material  and 
the  spiritual  universe,  though  in  origin  Platonic, 
are  the  most  vital  part  of  Christianity,  and  the 
secret  of  its  enduring  power  and  influence. 

The  first  question  has  been  commonly  taken 
as  the  main  subject  of  Eschatology.  And  it 
is  now  known  to  scholars  how  the  belief  in  a 
future  reign  of  the  Saints,  and  the  renovation 
of  the  world  and  material  conditions,  was  the 
dominant  hope  of  the  Jewish  race  in  the  age 
between  Alexander  the  Great  and  Augustus. 
The  whole  apocalyptic  literature,  which  was 
almost  unknown  to  previous  generations  of 
students,  has  been  unrolled  before  us.  And 
we  have  learned  how  many  of  the  phrases 
which  used  to  seem  peculiar  to  Christianity 
— the  Kingdom  of  God,  the  coming  Messiah, 
the  final  Judgment  —  were  really  current 
phrases  in  the  whole  world  of  .Judaism,  and 
had  a  meaning  which  must  have  governed 
the  thought  of  those  who  listened  to,  and 
those  who  reported,  the  first  Christian  teach- 
ing. The  different  schools  of  Judaism  held 
various  views  as  to  the  relations  in  place  and 
time  of  the  future  realm  to  the  present,  as  to 


168  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

the  resurrection  of  the  dead,  as  to  the  admis- 
sion of  Gentiles  to  the  benefits  of  the  coming 
kingdom.  Some  looked  for  a  merely  political 
restoration ;  some  took  a  more  materialist, 
some  a  more  spiritual,  view  of  the  conditions 
of  the  kingdom.  But  all  agreed  on  three 
points :  first,  that  the  Realm  was  in  the 
future  ;  second,  that  it  was  the  Jewish  nation, 
as  a  nation,  not  Jews  as  individuals,  who  were 
to  partake  of  it ;  third,  that  the  scene  of  it 
was  to  be  the  existing  visible  universe,  though 
it  might  be  that  the  universe  would  have  to 
be  prepared  for  it  by  unimagined  changes. 

The  second  question,  as  to  the  future  of  the 
individual  soul,  opens  up  a  far  more  difficult 
perspective.  Dr  Charles,  our  great  authority 
on  the  Jewish  apocalyptic  literature,  has  main- 
tained that  the  belief  in  future  bliss  for  the 
individual  in  the  realm  of  spirits  was  also  a 
product  of  the  apocalyptic  beliefs  of  the  Jews 
of  the  Hellenistic  age.  In  the  Old  Testament, 
Sheol,  the  place  of  the  spirits  of  the  dead,  is, 
he  says,  a  place  where  social  distinctions  per- 
sist but  not  moral  differences,  a  view  common 
in  the  primitive  thought  of  many  peoples.  But 
in  apocalyptic  literature  moral  distinctions 
prevail.     In  Enoch !  "  three  divisions  for  spirits 

1  xxii.   9-13.     Charles,  Between  the  Old  and  Ne?v   Testa- 
ments, p.  121. 


ESCHATOLOGY:    ETERNAL  LIFE       169 

or  souls  in  the  after-world  are  described :  the 
first  for  righteous  spirits ;  the  second  for  the 
spirits  of  sinners,  who  died  without  suffering 
retribution  in  this  world.  To  both  these 
classes  Sheol  will  be  an  intermediate  place, 
from  which  they  shall  rise  to  inherit  respec- 
tively blessedness  and  torment  at  the  day  of 
judgment.  The  third  division  is  for  the  spirits 
of  sinners  who  have  met  with  retribution  in 
this  life.  For  them  Sheol  has  become  an 
eternal  abode." 

Certainly  we  have  here  clearly  stated  a 
doctrine  of  Heaven,  Hell,  and  an  intermediate 
state.  But,  in  the  first  place,  it  may  be  doubted 
whether  this  doctrine,.which  first  appears  after 
the  Jews  had  been  widely  dispersed  among 
all  peoples,  was  really  of  Jewish  origin.  And, 
in  the  second  place,  it  is  doubtful  how  far  it 
affected  the  Christian  origins.  In  fact,  the 
perspective  of  the  future  world  which  we  find 
in  a  few  passages  (and  a  few  passages  only) 
of  the  Synoptic  Gospels  is  different.  The 
Hellenistic  Greeks,  who  surrounded  the  Jews 
on  all  sides,  and  mixed  with  them  in  the  great 
cities,  had  almost  all  advanced  from  the  merely 
primitive  notions  as  to  the  future  world  to  a 
belief  in  it  as  a  place  of  retribution,  of  reward 
and  punishment.  It  was  hardly  possible  that 
the  Jews  should  escape  the  infection.     But  the 


r 


170  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

other  hope,  of  a  national  revival  and  a  reign 
on  earth  of  the  Saints,  lay  at  a  deeper  stratum 
of  their  beliefs. 

The  third  question,  as  to  the  relations  of 
the  spiritual  and  the  material  worlds,  was 
scarcely  one  fitted  to  the  ordinary  Jewish 
intellect,  which  was  very  concrete  and  practical 
in  its  tendencies.  On  their  speculative  side, 
such  questions  belonged  rather  to  the  Mages 
of  Persia  and  the  Brahmins  of  India  than  to 
the  Semitic  peoples.  In  Greece  it  was  the 
genius  of  Plato  which  set  such  questions  going ; 
after  which  school  after  school  of  philosophy 
took  them  up,  and  provided  infinite  material 
for  discussion,  if  not  widely  accepted  solutions. 
I  think  that  it  was  in  the  treatment  of  this 
question  that  Christianity  showed  its  great 
originality.  And  in  its  answer  to  this  question 
it  really  answered  both  the  others  which  I 
have  mentioned  before  it.  The  answer  perhaps 
started  from  Platonism  ;  but  it  combined  with 
Platonism  a  profound  religiosity  such  as  was 
not  natural  to  the  Greek  mind,  and  is  matched 
only  in  the  utterances  of  some  of  the  great 
prophets  of  Israel. 

In  the  matter  of  eschatology,  as  in  other 
matters,  the  Fourth  Evangelist  starts  from 
the  universal  beliefs  of  his  time,  which  he 
even  shares  ;  but  he  rises  above  them  through 


ESCHATOLOGY:    ETERNAL   LIFE       171 

the  Spirit  into  the  wide  realm  of  the  higher 
life.  There  are  several  passages  which  prove 
that  the  writer,  like  his  contemporaries,  Jewish 
and  Christian,  was  looking  for  a  catastrophic 
coming  of  the  Messiah  and  a  great  judgment  of 
souls.  A  modern  reader  is  apt  to  be  unaware 
how  profoundly  this  belief  had  penetrated 
the  thinkers  and  writers  of  Judaea.  No  one 
indeed  had  fully  realised  this  until  the  recent 
publication  and  discussion  of  the  Jewish 
apocalyptic  writings.  It  was  into  the  Jewish 
world  dominated  by  these  .  ideas  that  Jesus 
was  born,  and  it  has  been  a  clear  result  of 
recent  criticism  that  they  formed  part  of  His 
habitual  thought.  However  much  we  may 
object  to  the  exaggerations  and  the  pedantry 
of  Dr  Schweitzer,  he  has  at  all  events  made 
us  more  fully  realise  this  fact. 

Nevertheless,  apocalyptic  expectations  were 
only  on  the  surface,  and  not  at  the  bottom  of 
the  teaching  of  Jesus.  The  parables  in  which 
He  set  forth  the  nature  of  the  Kingdom  of 
God,  the  discourses  of  which  the  Sermon  on 
the  Mount  is  the  most  noteworthy,  do  not  in 
the  main  refer  to  any  catastrophic  end  of  the 
world,  but  to  the  inner  Kingdom  of  the  Spirit, 
which  was  for  Jesus  the  ultimate  fact  of  life, 
and  the  dominance  of  which  over  what  was 
material  and  visible  was  to    Him    a   primary 


172  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

postulate.  In  the  future  there  will  no  doubt 
always  be  two  schools,  of  which  one  will 
regard  apocalyptic  beliefs  as  primary  in  the 
teaching  of  the  Founder,  and  the  lore  of  the 
kingdom  within  as  secondary ;  while  the  other 
school  will  reverse  the  order.  It  is  in  the 
latter  school  that  I  would  unhesitatingly  enrol 
myself. 

The  Fourth  Evangelist  in  this  matter,  as  in 
others,  carries  on  the  line  in  which  his  Master 
had  moved.  He  makes  statements  which 
imply  that  apocalyptic  beliefs  were  familiar  to 
him  and  not  unacceptable.  His  contemporary, 
John  the  prophet,  who  wrote  the  Apocalypse, 
is  entirely  dominated  by  tjiem,  and  strives  to 
read  in  the  book  of  fate  what  the  nature  of 
the  end  should  be.  In  a  few  passages  the 
Evangelist  speaks  almost  in  the  same  strain, 
notably  in  the  Epistle,1  "  Children,  it  is  the 
last  time ;  and  as  ye  heard  that  antichrist  is 
coming,  even  now  there  have  arisen  many 
antichrists."  But  here  the  antichrist  is  not  a 
hostile  power  which  shall  resolutely  oppose 
the  coming  of  the  kingdom,  but  he  who 
rejects  the  Christian  doctrine  and  despises  its 
communion.  To  the  Evangelist  the  long 
apocalyptic  passage  in  Mark's  Gospel  must 
have  been  familiar ;  and  though  he  does  not 

1  ii.  18. 


ESCHATOLOGY:    ETERNAL   LIFE       173 

enlarge  upon  it,  he  does  not  repudiate  it.  Yet 
he  rarely,  if  ever,  makes  a  statement  of  an 
apocalyptic  character  without  adding  words 
which;  so  to  speak,  baptise  it  into  the  name 
of  the  risen  Christ,  subordinating  dreams  of 
the  future  to  experiences  of  the  present.  And 
the  hopes  and  beliefs  which  were  destined  in 
the  Church  to  take  the  place  left  vacant  by 
apocalyptic  beliefs  as  they  died  of  inanition, 
are  all  to  be  found  in  his  writings,  as  perhaps 
nowhere  else. 

The  earliest  of  the  passages  which  specially 
concern  us  occurs  in  the  discourse  of  the  fifth 
chapter:  "The  Father  hath  committed  judg- 
ment to  the  Son."  That  might  seem  a  trans- 
lation into  the  language  of  the  Evangelist  of 
the  ordinary  Christian  apocalyptic  belief  in  the 
coming  of  the  Son  of  Man  in  the  clouds.  But 
in  the  context  in  which  it  comes  it  seems 
rather  to  speak  of  a  testing  of  souls,  and  an 
ordaining  to  eternal  life  in  the  present  world. 
This  becomes  clearer  as  we  proceed :  "  The 
hour  is  coming,  and  now  is,  when  the  dead 
shall  hear  the  voice  of  the  Son  of  God,  and 
those  that  hear  shall  live."  Here  again,  at 
the  first  reading,  we  seem  to  hear  apocalyptic 
teaching,  but  the  phrase  "  and  now  is  "  is  de- 
cisive, and  proves  that  the  writer  was  thinking 
of  present  experience,  that  what  was  primary 


174  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

in  his  mind  was  the  call,  the  voice  of  Christ 
offering  life  to  those  who  were  spiritually 
dead,  and  lifting  them  into  the  realm  which 
is  eternal. 

In  the  narrative  of  the  raising  of  Lazarus, 
Martha  gives  utterance  to  the  usual  beliefs  of 
the  time :  "  I  know  that  he  will  rise  again  in 
the  resurrection  at  the  last  day."  And  the 
Evangelist,  in  his  usual  manner,  uses  the  crass 
statement  of  the  plain  and  unimaginative 
person  as  a  foil  to  set  forth  the  great  doctrines 
which  he  has  to  proclaim :  "  I  am  the  Resur- 
rection and  the  Life :  he  that  believeth  in 
Me,  though  he  die,  yet  shall  he  live ;  and  he 
that  liveth  and  believeth  in  Me  shall  never 
die."  Owing  to  their  use  in  the  burial  service, 
these  words  come  to  us  with  most  solemn 
associations ;  but  as  they  stand  they  are  a 
sublime  assertion  of  the  relation  of  the 
members  of  the  Church  to  their  invisible 
Head  ;  conversion  is  an  arising  from  the  dead  ; 
and  the  life  which  the  believer  shares  with 
Christ  is  out  of  relation  to  time,  is  eternal  in 
the  heavens. 

In  the  last  great  discourse,  the  apocalyptic 
vision  has  almost  faded,  though  the  destiny  of 
the  believer  still  remains  as  a  starting-point 
for  faith.  "  I  will  come  again  and  receive  you 
unto  Myself,  that  where  I  am,  ye  may  be  also." 


ESCHATOLOGY:    ETERNAL   LIFE       175 

"  In  My  Father's  house  are  many  abodes,  I 
go  to  prepare  a  place  for  you."  To  much 
the  same  effect  is  a  passage  in  the  Epistle,1 
"  When  He  shall  appear,  we  shall  be  like  Him, 
for  we  shall  see  Him  as  He  is." 

In  one  place  the  function  of  arbiter  in  the 
final  judgment  is  transferred  to  the  ivords,  "If 
any  man  hear  My  sayings  and  keep  them  not, 
I  judge  him  not :  for  I  came  not  to  judge 
the  world,  but  to  save  the  world.  He  that 
rejecteth  Me,  and  receiveth  not  My  sayings, 
hath  one  that  judgeth  him :  the  word  that  I 
spake,  the  same  shall  judge  him  in  the  last 
day."2  It  will  be  evident  to  everyone  who 
reflects  that  we  are  here  in  quite  a  different 
atmosphere  from  that  of  the  Synoptists.  The 
Jesus  of  history  did  accept  eschatological 
beliefs  ;  He  thought  of  the  course  of  the  exist- 
ing scheme  of  things  as  approaching  its  end. 
And  He  may  even  have  accepted  the  belief, 
which  certainly  was  eagerly  and  tenaciously 
held  in  the  Society,  that  He  was  to  come  again 
as  judge  of  mankind,  and  ruler  in  a  renovated 
and  spiritualised  world.  But  the  inspiration  of 
the  Fourth  Evangelist  reached  beyond  this 
view.  Faith  in  Christ  was  eternal  life  here 
and  now,  whether  in  the  present  evil  world 
or  in  a  transformed  one.     By  his  relation  to 

1  iii.  2.  "  xii.  47. 


r 


176  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

Christ  and  to  the  earthly  Body  of  Christ  a 
man  was  absolved  or  condemned  in  the  judg- 
ment of  souls,  whether  present  or  future.  In 
the  Synoptic  Gospels  we  have  a  certain  con- 
fusion of  tense,  spiritual  life  being  spoken 
of  sometimes  as  present  and  sometimes  as 
future,  although,  especially  in  the  Gospel  of 
Matthew,  the  present  tense  far  outweighs  the 
future.  But  in  the  Fourth  Gospel  the  future 
tense  has  almost  disappeared.  Eternal  life 
lies  about  us  here  and  now.  Only  occasion- 
ally, as  in  the  passage  before  us,  the  current 
beliefs  seem  to  dictate  the  form  of  speech. 

We  know  that,  in  the  beliefs  of  ordinary 
Christians,  as  the  apocalyptic  hope  died  out, 
another  definite  expectation  took  its  place. 
When  men  wearied  of  looking  for  a  Second 
Coming  of  the  Son  of  Man  in  the  clouds  of 
heaven,  for  a  judgment  before  a  great  white 
throne,  and  a  millennial  reign  of  the  Saints  on 
earth,  there  arose  a  belief  in  the  judgment  of 
individual  souls  at  death,  and  their  assignment 
either  to  heavenly  joys  or  to  eternal  pains. 
In  fact,  the  two  beliefs  in  a  general  judgment 
and  in  an  individual  judgment,  inconsistent  as 
they  are  one  with  another,  kept  their  places 
side  by  side,  the  second  advancing  as  the 
former  receded  and  became  more  visionary. 
And  so  it  has  remained  even  to  our  own  days. 


ESCHATOLOGY:    ETERNAL   LIFE       177 

We  still  repeat  in  the  Creeds  a  belief  in  the 
Second  Coming  to  judgment :  but  the  mass  of 
Christians  have  had  a  more  potent  and  practi- 
cal belief  in  the  joys  of  heaven  and  the  pains  of 
hell  as  waiting  for  the  soul  when  it  leaves  the 
body.  This  latter  expectation  is  so  stern  and 
terrible  that  before  long  the  consciousness  of 
the  Church  had  accepted  a  belief  in  an  inter- 
mediate realm,  a  purgatory  where  sins  could 
be  by  degrees  wiped  out  and  atoned  for ;  hell 
remaining  as  a  threatened  fate  only  for  those 
who  died  in  mortal  sin.  But  the  belief  in 
purgatory  was  one  which  lent  itself  to  extra- 
ordinary corruptions  and  abuses.  The  Church 
practically  claimed  the  power  to  do  as  she 
pleased  with  the  souls"  in  purgatory  :  to  shorten 
or  to  protract  their  punishment.  It  is  obvious 
what  a  terrible  weapon  was  thus  put  into  the 
hands  of  the  rulers  of  the  Church.  We  can- 
not wonder  that  it  was  a  revolt  against  the 
abuses  of  the  doctrine  of  purgatory  which 
precipitated  the  great  Teutonic  revolt  against 
Rome  in  the  sixteenth  century. 

No  phrase  is  more  characteristic  of  the 
Fourth  Gospel  than  the  phrase  "  eternal  life  " 
(£a>T7  aiwvLos).1  An  examination  of  the  mean- 
ing given  to  the  phrase  by  the  Evangelist  and 

1  In  the  English  Bible,  the  word  auoj/ios  is  sometimes 
rendered  bv  eternal  and  sometimes  by  everlasting. 

12 


178  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

by  his  contemporaries  will  bring  into  clear 
relief  some  of  the  chief  features  of  his  theology. 
The  phrase  first  meets  us  in  the  Septuagint 
version  of  Daniel  in  connection  with  the 
coming  reign  of  the  Messiah.  The  Kingdom 
of  the  Messiah  is  to  be  eternal,  his  dominion 
everlasting.1  And  it  is  added  that  in  the 
great  convulsion  to  come  the  dead  shall 
awake,  "  some  to  everlasting  life,  and  some 
to  shame  and  everlasting  contempt."  Here 
the  eternal  life  of  the  good  Israelite  is  clearly 
life  in  the  divine  Kingdom  of  the  future. 

The  phrase  occurs  in  a  few  passages  of  the 
Synoptic,  Gospels.  In  one  scene  recorded  by 
all  three  writers,2  Jesus  is  asked  by  a  wealthy 
young  man  what  he  must  do  to  acquire  eternal 
life.  The  answer,  "Sell  all  that  thou  hast," 
is  familiar  to  us.  The  same  question  is  said 
on  another  occasion3  to  have  been  asked  by 
a  lawyer  in  order  to  try  Jesus.  If  these  words 
were  actually  used  by  the  hearers  of  Jesus, 
we  must  suppose  that  they  had  reference,  as 
the  phrase  has  in  Daniel,  to  life  in  the  future 
Kingdom  of  the  Messiah.  For  the  belief  in 
that  Kingdom,  and  the  expectation  of  it,  took 
so  large  a  place  in  the  minds  of  pious  Jews 

1  Daniel  vii.  14. 

2  Matt.  xix.  16;  Mark  x.  17;  Luke  xviii.  18. 

3  Luke  x.  25. 


ESCHATOLOGY:    ETERNAL   LIFE       179 

at  the  time,  that  out  of  the  abundance  of 
the  heart  the  mouth  would  speak.  All  the 
Synoptists  add,  after  the  question  of  the 
wealthy  young  man  and  its  answer,  a  com- 
ment by  Jesus :  "  Everyone  that  hath  left 
houses,  or  brethren,  or  sisters,  or  father,  or 
mother,  or  children,  or  lands  for  My  name's 
sake,  shall  receive  a  hundredfold,  and  shall 
inherit  eternal  life."  So  Matthew  (xix.  29). 
But  the  variations  in  the  other  two  Synoptists 
are  striking.  Mark 1  writes,  "  He  shall  receive 
a  hundredfold  now  in  this  time,  houses,  and 
brethren,  and  sisters,  and  mothers,  and  children, 
and  lands,  with  persecutions ;  and  in  the  age 
to  come  eternal  life."  Luke 2  omits  the  phrase 
about  houses,  and  brethren,  and  sisters,  and 
mothers,  which  obviously  could  not  be  taken 
literally  ;  but  he  repeats  the  contrast  between 
"  this  time  "  and  "  the  age  to  come." 

However  that  be,  if  we  take  the  passages 
which  I  have  cited  as  they  stand,  it  seems 
clear  that  those  who  wrote  them  meant  by 
"  eternal  life "  what  Daniel  means  by  it,  life 
in  the  Messianic  Kingdom.  The  phrases  in 
Mark  and  Luke,  "  this  time  "  and  "  the  age  to 
come,"  are  the  regular  phrases  for  a  contrast 
between  the  world  as  it  was,  and  the  world  as 
it  was  to  be  in  the  Messianic  age.     It  seems 

1  x.  30.  2  xviii.  30. 


180  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

clear  that  whatever  was  the  real  thought  of 
the  Master,  His  ordinary  hearers  supposed 
Him  to  refer  to  their  beliefs  in  a  change  in 
the  existing  world  or  age,  and  a  future  reign 
of  the  Saints. 

In  many  passages,  however,  in  the  Synoptists, 
the  word  life,  without  the  adjective  eternal,  is 
used  in  a  lofty  and  transcendent  sense.  This 
was  no  new  thing  in  Israel.  In  some  of  the 
Psalms  the  word  life  does  not  mean  the  mere 
visible  life  on  earth,  but  something  far  nobler. 
"Thou  wilt  show  me  the  path  of  life";  "In 
his  favour  is  life " ;  "  My  prayer  unto  the 
God  of  my  life."  In  such  phrases  as  these 
there  is  a  deeper  meaning  than  that  of  mere 
material  existence  :  a  reference  to  the  refresh- 
ing and  upraising  of  the  spirit  by  contact 
with  God.  More  inward  and  more  mystic  in 
the  best  sense  of  the  word  are  such  sayings  in 
the  Synoptists  as  "  The  way  that  leadeth  unto 
life  " ;  "  He  that  will  save  his  life  shall  lose  it  "  ; 
"  It  is  good  for  thee  to  enter  into  life  maimed 
or  halt."  Such  sayings  are  of  the  essence 
of  spiritual  religion ;  and  if  an  eschatological 
shadow  occasionally  falls  across  them,  it  can 
scarcely  mar  their  brightness. 

When  we  turn  to  the  use  of  the  phrase 
"  eternal  life  "  in  the  writings  of  St  Paul  and 
the  Fourth  Gospel,  we  find  ourselves  in  quite 


ESCHATOLOGY:    ETERNAL   LIFE       181 

a  new  spiritual  region.  The  tense  is  changed 
from  the  future  to  the  present.  To  St  Paul 
eternal  life  is  the  gift  of  God,  and  its  essence 
lies  in  partaking  in  the  life  of  Christ,  in  being 
grafted  into  Him  and  being  ruled  by  his 
spirit.  The  author  of  Acts,  though  he  often 
fails  to  understand  the  Pauline  ideas,  puts  the 
"  eternal  life  "  in  the  front  of  his  teaching. 
He  represents  Paul  and  Barnabas  as  saying  to 
the  Jews,1  "  Seeing  ye  thrust  from  you  the 
word  of  God,  and  judge  yourselves  unworthy 
of  eternal  life,  lo,  we  turn  to  the  Gentiles." 
In  St  Paul's  own  Epistles  the  idea  is  set  forth 
with  the  utmost  variety  of  expression.  "  The 
gift  of  God  is  eternal,  life  in  Jesus  Christ  our 
Lord."2  "He  that  soweth  unto  the  Spirit 
shall  of  the  Spirit  reap  eternal  life."3  "Ye 
died,  and  your  life  is  hid  with  Christ  in  God." 4 
It  is  unnecessary  to  multiply  quotations,  many 
of  which  will  at  once  occur  to  the  minds  of  all 
who  are  familiar  with  the  New  Testament. 

It  is  certain  that,  at  all  events  until  near 
the  close  of  his  life,  St  Paul  was  earnestly 
looking  for  a  catastrophic  return  of  his  Master 
in  glory,  to  judge  mankind,  and  to  set  up  on 
earth  a  Messianic  kingdom.  But  the  eternal 
life  of  which  he  speaks  does  not  wait  for  that 

1  Acts  xiii.  46.  2  Romans  vi.  23. 

3  Gal.  vi.  8.  4  Col.  iii.  3. 


182  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

catastrophe,  in  order  then  to  be  revealed.  It 
is  the  possession  of  the  Christian  from  the 
moment  when  he  turns  to  Christ  and  lays 
hold  of  the  salvation  which  He  has  revealed. 
Thenceforward,  it  is  in  him  an  undying 
principle,  beyond  the  reach  of  destruction 
either  by  man  or  by  spiritual  powers ;  even 
the  death  of  the  body  cannot  quench  it.  "  To 
be  spiritually  minded  is  life  and  peace."1  As 
the  depths  of  the  sea  are  untroubled,  whatever 
storms  may  be  raging  on  its  surface,  so  the 
Christian  can  remain  calm  amid  all  outward 
commotions  and  misfortunes.  His  heart  is 
in  heaven,  though  he  has  to  live  in  the  visible 
world.  No  doubt  there  is  here  some  incon- 
sistency in  the  Apostle's  teaching.  The 
notions  of  a  visible  judgment  and  a  temporal 
reign  of  the  Saints  can  scarcely  be  reconciled 
with  the  notion  of  a  present  exalted  life, 
unaffected  by  the  outward  changes  of  the 
world.  But  it  is  only  the  logical  modern 
mind  which  finds  much  difficulty  in  such 
inconsistencies.  It  is  only  the  over-trained 
modern  investigator  who  would  think  it 
necessary  to  try  to  bring  order  into  the  vast 
and  rugged  landscape  visible  to  St  Paul. 
Ideas  surge  up  in  his  mind  and  find  expres- 
sion, not  as  parts  of  an  intellectual  system, 

1  Rom.  viii.  6, 


ESCHATOLOGY:    ETERNAL   LIFE       183 

but  as  the  immediate  utterance  of  an  internal 
inspiration. 

We  have  still  to  consider  in  what  light  the 
Fourth  Evangelist  regards  the  eternal  life  of 
which  he  often  speaks  from  many  points  of 
view.  His  thought  on  the  subject  is  essentially 
in  a  line  with  that  of  St  Paul ;  but  the  two 
great  teachers  of  spiritual  Christianity  have 
different  ways  of  setting  it  forth.  In  St  Paul 
the  idea  of  eternal  life  seems  to  have  arisen 
fully  developed  at  the  time  of  his  conversion  ; 
he  does  not  explain  it,  he  only  tries  to  express 
it.  The  Evangelist  is  more  contemplative ; 
and  in  his  time  the  necessity  of  bringing  the 
idea  into  more  definite  relations  with  the 
actual  life  of  the  Church  had  become  apparent. 
Also  he  may  be  said  to  discard  the  belief  in 
a  Second  Coming  as  an  impediment  to  the 
course  of  spiritual  religion.  He  represents 
his  Master  as  promising  to  come  again  to  the 
disciples :  "  I  will  not  leave  you  desolate,  I 
will  come  unto  you."1  But  the  coming  is  an 
inward  one,  not  a  catastrophic  and  visible 
Parousia ;  for  in  the  same  address  to  the 
disciples,  Jesus  speaks  in  a  perfectly  parallel 
way  of  the  coming  of  the  Paraclete,  who 
will  dwell  in  the  Church  and  inspire  it. 

In  the  mind  of  the  Evangelist,  eternal  life  is 

1  Jolin  xiv.  18. 


184  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

not  disconnected  from  the  rites  of  the  Church. 
He  writes,  "  Except  a  man  be  born  of  water 
and  of  the  Spirit,  he  cannot  enter  into  the 
Kingdom  of  God."  It  cannot  well  be  doubted 
that  he  is  here  speaking  of  baptism  as  the 
authorised  gate  of  entrance  into  the  Society. 
And  he  must  be  thinking  of  the  Christian 
Communion  when  he  writes :  "  The  bread  of 
God  is  that  which  cometh  down  out  of  heaven, 
and  giveth  life  unto  the  world."  "  Except  ye 
eat  the  flesh  of  the  Son  of  Man  and  drink  His 
blood,  ye  have  not  life  in  yourselves.  He  that 
eateth  My  flesh  and  drinketh  My  blood  hath 
eternal  life."  It  is  curious  that  after  the  last 
saying  we  have  a  momentary  relapse  into  the 
eschatological  way  of  thinking,  "  1  will  raise 
him  up  at  the  last  day." 

In  what  light  the  Evangelist  looked  upon 
the  principle  of  Life  it  is  hard  to  say,  whether 
he  regarded  it  as  in  a  sense  material  or  as 
wholly  immaterial.  Some  of  his  sayings  seem 
to  take  Life  as  a  thing  which  could  be  trans- 
ferred from  person  to  person.  "  As  the 
Father  hath  life  in  Himself,  even  so  gave  He 
to  the  Son  to  have  life  in  Himself."  "  The 
Son  giveth  life  to  whom  He  would."1  We 
might  even  combine  these  sayings  with  that  in 
regard  to  the  sacrament,  "  He  that  eateth  My 

1  John  v.  21,  26. 


ESCHATOLOGY:    ETERNAL   LIFE       185 

flesh  and  drinketh  My  blood  hath  eternal 
life,"  and  derive  a  merely  magical  doctrine  of 
the  physical  acquirement  of  eternal  life  in  the 
sacrament.  But  in  doing  so  we  should  do 
the  Evangelist  an  infinite  injustice.  Such 
teaching  is  utterly  out  of  harmony  with  his 
trend  of  thought.  If  in  one  place  he  speaks 
thus  of  the  sacrament,  in  the  very  same 
discourse  he  writes,  "  The  words  that  I  speak 
unto  you  are  spirit  and  are  life."  And  in  the 
Epistle  he  writes,  "  He  that  doeth  the  will  of 
God  abideth  for  ever."  We  can  seldom,  in 
the  case  of  the  Evangelist,  take  one  of  his 
phrases  as  expressing  the  whole  of  his  view : 
he  expresses  various  sides  of  what  he  regards 
as  the  truth  in  various  passages,  or  even  in 
the  same  passage. 

The  notions  as  to  what  was  material  and 
what  was  immaterial,  what  was  physical 
influence  and  what  influence  of  the  spirit, 
were  not  clearly  defined  in  the  mind  of  the 
Evangelist.  Is  there  not  very  often  a  similar 
confusion  in  the  modern  mind  ?  Did  not 
Mesmer  speak  of  the  influence  of  mind  on 
mind  as  animal  magnetism  ?  All  the  words 
which  we  apply  to  the  motions  of  mind  and 
spirit  are  necessarily  taken  from  the  phenomena 
of  sense,  and  usually  carry  with  them  some 
sense  implications. 


186  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

In  the  chapter  which  treats  of  the  Sacra- 
ments I  will  return  to  this  question. 

Eternal  life  is  also  by  the  Evangelist  re- 
garded as  closely  related  to  certain  affirmations 
of  doctrine.  We  see  the  steps  towards  this 
in  such  a  saying  as  "  This  is  life  eternal,  that 
they  should  know  Thee  the  only  true  God,  and 
Him  whom  Thou  didst  send,  Jesus  Christ."1 
But  here  the  affirmation  of  the  need  of  a  creed 
is  not  emphatic,  since  the  writer  often  uses  the 
words  "  to  know  "  in  a  practical  rather  than  in 
a  theoretical  sense.  To  know  is  to  be  in  re- 
lations with,  to  grasp.  But  in  other  passages 
the  need  of  right  doctrinal  views  is  more 
strongly  emphasised.  "  He  that  believeth 2 
not  the  Son  shall  not  see  life,  but  the 
wrath  of  God  abideth  on  him."  Less  severe  is 
another  passage :  "  He  that  heareth  My  word, 
and  believeth  Him  that  sent  Me,  hath  eternal 
life." 

In  the  Epistle,  probably  written  by  the 
Evangelist  when  old.  the  failure  of  his  powers 
and  indignation  against  some  heretics  who 
were  troubling  the  Church  at  Ephesus  drive 
the  writer  in  the  direction  of  dogma.     "  Who 

1  John  xvii.  3. 

2  John  hi.  36.  The  revisers  give  as  an  alternative 
reading  "obeyeth  not  the  Son."  The  meaning  is  doubtful, 
and  it  is  possible  that  the  Evangelist's  intention  was  not 
clear  in  his  mind. 


ESCHATOLOGY:    ETERNAL   LIFE       187 

is  the  liar  save  him  that  denieth  that  Jesus 
is  the  Christ  ?  This  is  the  antichrist,  even  he 
that  denieth  the  Father  and  the  Son."  Such 
utterances  do  not  very  well  harmonise  with 
the  great  theme  of  the  Epistle,  "  God  is  love." 

It  is  not,  however,  very  difficult  to  see  the 
attitude  of  the  Evangelist's  mind.  Religion 
to  him  was  at  bottom  purely  spiritual  worship. 
But  he  could  not  conceive  such  worship  as 
existing  outside  the  Society.  It  was  the 
Church  for  which  Christ  died,  and  which 
continued  on  earth  the  life  of  Christ,  which  was 
the  seat  of  spiritual  religion ;  and  eternal  life, 
salvation,  belonged  only  to  it.  Therefore  the 
rites  which  shut  it  off  from  the  world,  and  the 
beliefs  in  which  all  its  members  were  united, 
were  sacred  ;  and  outside  the  ranks  of  those 
who  received  them  eternal  life  could  not  be 
found.  The  general  expressions  implying 
that  the  Logos  enlightened  all  men,  and  that 
Christ  died  for  the  world,  are  concessions,  but 
they  cannot  compete  in  the  mind  of  the  writer 
with  his  intense  belief  in  the  Logos  Society. 
And  here,  as  in  other  matters,  he  fully  develops 
the  views  of  St  Paul. 

The  second  school  of  Christian  teaching, 
St  Paul  and  the  Fourth  Evangelist,  never 
preached  a  doctrine  of  heaven  and  hell  for 
individual  souls,  but  a  doctrine  of  eternal  life, 


188  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

which  was  to  be  partaken  of  in  the  present 
age,  but  which  went  beyond  the  present  life 
into  that  beyond  the  grave.  Those  who  were 
united  to  Christ  by  faith  had  in  them  this  life, 
and  they  should  never  perish,  nor  should  any 
power  be  able  to  pluck  them  from  the  hand  of 
God.  Those  who  had  not  in  them  the  seeds 
of  eternal  life  must  perish  and  disappear,  as  all 
visible  things  in  the  world  perish  and  disappear. 
The  Fourth  Evangelist  regards  this  life  as 
neither  present  nor  future,  but  as  timeless,  as 
even  now  hid  with  Christ  in  God,  while  the 
life  which  we  live  in  the  flesh  is  little  more 
than  illusion. 

The  liturgy  of  the  English  Church  fluctuates 
between  the  eschatological  and  the  mystic  use 
of  the  phrase  "eternal  life."  In  the  collect 
for  the  second  Sunday  in  Advent,  the  phrase  is, 
"the  blessed  hope  of  everlasting  life."  But  in 
the  collect  for  Monday  in  Easter  week,  the 
phrase  runs  that  God  in  Christ  has  "overcome 
death,  and  opened  unto  us  the  gate  of  ever- 
lasting life."  The  second  of  these  phrases, 
rather  than  the  first,  is  in  the  line  of  thought 
of  our  Evangelist,  to  whom  eternal  life  was 
essentially  not  a  hope,  but  a  spiritual  ex- 
perience. 


IX 
THE  SACRAMENTS 

I  do  not  propose  here  to  repeat  the  ex- 
position by  which,  in  a  recent  work,1  I  have 
drawn  out  the  parallel  between  Pauline 
Christianity  and  Pagan  Mysteries.  I  there 
set  forth  as  the  three  main  features  of  the 
Mysteries  the  following :  first,  that  they  had 
rites  of  purification  and  tests  on  entry  into  the 
Society ;  second,  that  they  had  means  of 
communication  with  some  deity  to  whom  they 
looked  up  as  their  head ;  third,  that  they 
extended  their  view  beyond  the  present  life 
into  the  world  beyond  the  grave.  And  I 
showed  that  in  all  these  respects  there  is  a 
parallelism  between  them  and  the  Pauline 
churches.  In  some  ways,  as  in  the  possession 
of  a  regular  order  of  priests  or  hierophants, 
and  in  the  attribution  of  a  magical  efficacy  to 
the  mere   external   facts   of  the    Sacraments, 

1   The  Religious  Experience  of  St  Paul,  pp.  57-101. 
189 


190  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

the  Church  of  the  second  century  was  much 
nearer  to  the  Mysteries  than  the  Church  in  the 
time  of  St  Paul.  But  in  the  three  respects 
which  I  have  mentioned  there  is  an  undeniable 
similarity  between  the  first  churches  and  the 
Greek  thiasi ;  and  we  cannot  be  surprised 
that  the  Roman  magistrates,  looking  on  the 
religions  of  the  subject  peoples  with  the  same 
calm  indifference  with  which  English  officials 
in  India  regard  the  popular  beliefs,  considered 
the  Christian  Church  to  be  only  another  of 
the  many  mystic  sects  to  which  they  were 
accustomed. 

It  was  the  close  union  which  bound  together 
the  members  of  the  Church,  and  their  professed 
adherence  to  a  spiritual  Head  and  source  of 
life,  which  made  them  most  closely  like  the 
Pagan  societies.  Here  we  are  on  safe  ground. 
For  whereas  the  evidence  as  to  the  particular 
tenets  and  particular  rites  of  this  or  that  Pagan 
thiasos  is  of  the  most  fragmentary  and  fugitive 
character,  so  that  our  knowledge  of  them  must 
always  be  very  slight,  yet  on  this  particular 
point,  the  spiritual  unity  of  the  thiasos,  and  its 
devotion  to  its  chosen  deity,  the  testimony  of 
Apuleius  and  other  writers  of  the  age  is  quite 
decisive. 

Critics  have  rebuked  me  for  finding  some 
kinship  between  the  Christianity  preached  by 


THE   SACRAMENTS  191 

St  Paul  and  the  Mystery  Religions  of  the 
Greek  world.  They  seem  to  think  that  by 
pointing  out  this  kinship  I  insult  Christianity. 
There  is  no  insult  and  no  slight  in  question. 
If  we  believe,  with  the  Fourth  Evangelist, 
that  the  divine  Logos  enlightens  every  man 
who  comes  into  the  world ;  if  we  hold  that 
the  Providence  of  God  is  not  confined  to  the 
Christian  Church,  but  takes  within  its  action 
all  mankind,  that  God  is  the  God  of  the  whole 
earth,  we  shall  find  nothing  repulsive  and 
nothing  incongruous  in  the  notion  that  the 
light  which  shines  so  fully  in  the  Bible  and 
in  the  history  of  the  Church,  shines  also  in  a 
measure  outside  the  Church.  We  may  hold 
that  not  only  the  religion  of  the  Jews,  but  also 
the  religions  of  I  sis  and  of  Mithras,  had  in 
them  some  of  the  elements  which  went  to  the 
nutriment  of  infant  Christianity. 

If  it  can  be  shown,  on  historic  grounds,  that 
there  was  no  relation  and  no  parallel  between 
the  Mysteries  and  Pauline  and  Johannine 
Christianity,  so  be  it.  But  the  critics  who 
take  this  view  content  themselves,  so  far  as 
I  have  observed,  with  pointing  out  the  many 
and  clear  points  of  dissimilarity  between 
Christian  and  Pagan  doctrines  of  salvation ; 
they  do  not,  and  cannot,  disprove  all  likeness 
between  them.     The  differences  are  obvious 


192  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

enough.  The  most  noteworthy  among  them 
is  the  presence  in  Christianity,  and  the  absence 
in  the  Pagan  Mysteries,  of  a  strong  historic 
element.  Isis  and  Mithras  were  figures  of 
mythology,  not  of  history.  The  help  given 
by  Isis  to  her  votaries,  the  labours  of  Mithras 
in  the  service  of  mankind,  were  to  be  appre- 
hended only  by  faith.  But  Jesus  had  dwelt 
on  earth,  had  formed  a  society  in  Palestine, 
had  suffered  and  died  under  Pontius  Pilate. 
Though  the  Exalted  Christ  was  the  source  of 
the  life  of  the  Church,  yet  the  Church  was 
certain  that  the  life  in  Heaven  and  in  the 
Church  of  Christ  was  a  direct  continuation  of 
the  human  life  of  the  Founder.  Of  course 
these  facts  at  once  draw  a  broad  line  of  dis- 
tinction between  the  Mystery  Religions  and 
Christianity.  Also  the  connection  of  Christi- 
anity with  the  Old  Testament  and  the  life  of 
the  Jewish  people  caused  it  to  set  forth  on  a 
higher  ethical  level  than  any  sect  of  Paganism. 
All  our  evidence  shows  that  the  great  teachers 
of  early  Christianity  would  have  nothing  to 
do  with  the  Pagan  rites,  but  regarded  them  as 
the  invention  of  evil  spirits.  That  they  would 
at  all  consciously  adopt  them,  or  borrow  from 
them,  is  most  unlikely.  Yet  in  any  broad  view 
of  history  it  will  appear  that  ideas,  when,  as 
it  is  said,  they  are  in  the  air,  appear  at  the 


THE   SACRAMENTS  193 

same  time  in  varied  forms  in  many  schools  of 
thought  and  in  many  organised  societies,  when 
we  cannot  trace  any  visible  lines  of  influence. 
The  ideas  are,  like  Virgil's  spirits  in  Hades, 
waiting  eagerly  for  a  body  in  which  they  may 
clothe  themselves  so  as  to  appear  on  the  stage 
of  mundane  affairs  ;  and  no  one  can  say  whence 
they  come  or  whither  they  go. 

I  do  not  greatly  differ  from  one  of  the  most 
learned  and  most  recent  writers  on  the  subject, 
Dr   H.  A.  A.  Kennedy.1     He   lays   stronger 
emphasis    on    the    differences    between    the 
Mystery   Religions    and    Paulinism,    which   I 
fully  allow,  whereas   I   have   dwelt  more  on 
their  parallelism,  which  Dr  Kennedy  does  not 
really  dispute.     He  speaks  strongly  as  to  the 
ethical  superiority  of  the  Pauline  faith,  as  to 
the  loftier  view  which  St  Paul  takes  of  salva- 
tion, and  especially  on  the  difference  between 
faith  in  a  historic  person  and  faith  in  a  mytho- 
logical  personage.     But  he   allows   the  wide 
prevalence  in  the  cities  in  which  the  Pauline 
Churches  were  founded  of  the  mystery  ideas, 
and  St  Paul's  familiarity  with  them. 

The  belief  in  an  inspired  society  and  in  the 
eternal  life  in  which  that  society  is  rooted,  is 
not   only  mystic  in  the   best   sense,  that  is, 

i  St  Paul  and  the  Mystery  Religions,  London,  1913,  last 
chapter. 


194  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

related  to  the  higher  hidden  life  which  lies  at 
the  roots  of  the  visible  life,  but  it  is  also  mystic 
in  a  more  historic  and  superficial  sense,  as  an 
outgrowth,  and  by  far  the  most  noteworthy 
and  valuable  outgrowth,  of  a  tendency  which 
at  the  beginning  of  the  Christian  era  had  been 
for  centuries  growing  and  strengthening  in 
the  world,  and  which  had  found  a  temporary 
and  insufficient  abiding  place  in  the  Pagan 
Mysteries. 

In  this  main  respect  there  is  a  close  similarity 
between  the  views  of  St  Paul  and  those  of  the 
Fourth  Evangelist.  But  when  we  come  to 
details,  and  look  more  closely  at  what  the 
latter  writer  has  to  say  in  regard  to  the  Christ 
who  is  the  Head  of  the  Church,  the  relations 
of  the  members  one  to  another,  the  rite  of 
admission  to  the  Church  and  the  Lord's 
Supper,  the  future  life,  and  so  forth,  we  find 
that  the  Evangelist  has  views  of  his  own  which 
are  not  always  identical  with  the  Pauline. 
And  he  has  a  cast  of  mind  very  different  from 
that  of  St  Paul,  which  makes  him  find  very 
different  ways  of  stating  his  doctrines  from 
those  which  we  meet  in  the  Pauline  Epistles. 

In  the  present  chapter  we  deal  with  his 
views  in  regard  to  the  Christian  Sacraments. 
The  Pagan  Mystery  Religions  had  their  sacra- 
ments— sacraments   of    initiation    and    sacra- 


THE   SACRAMENTS  195 

merits  of  communion — so  constantly,  that  one 
might  well  term  them  Sacramental  Religions. 
The  views  of  the  Fourth  Evangelist  resemble 
theirs  as  a  cultivated  plum  resembles  a  wild 
one. 

It  is  by  general  consent,  and  by  a  sort  of 
inspired  instinct,  that  in  all  the  ages  of  the 
Church,  alike  by  the  great  writers  of  the 
Church  and  by  the  artists  who  give  visible 
form  to  popular  beliefs,  the  Evangelist  has 
been  regarded  as  the  great  teacher  on  the 
subject  of  the  Sacraments.  In  his  third 
chapter,  in  the  discourse  to  Nicodemus,  the 
doctrine  is  set  forth  that  it  is  not  only  by  a 
spiritual  renovation,,  but  also  by  being  born 
of  water,  that  is,  by  undergoing  the  rite  of 
Christian  baptism,  that  a  man  is  brought  into 
the  redeemed  Society  of  the  Christian  Church. 
And  the  Fathers  of  the  Church  have  usually 
regarded  the  sublime  teaching  of  the  sixth 
chapter,  as  to  eating  the  flesh  and  drinking  the 
blood  of  the  Son  of  Man,  as  a  clear  allusion 
to  the  life-giving  virtues  of  the  Lord's  Supper. 
Here  they  have  been  followed  by  Christian 
teachers  of  all  ages.  And  the  sculptors  of  the 
mediaeval  church  have  adopted  their  view.  In 
the  sculptural  decorations  of  our  cathedrals, 
St  John  carries  the  cup,  as  St  Peter  holds  the 
keys,  and  St  Paul  the  sword. 


196  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

That  is  one  side  of  the  matter.  But  there 
is  another  side  which  seems  in  irreconcilable 
contrast  with  it.  Whereas  the  Synoptic 
writers  narrate  the  baptism  of  Jesus  in  Jordan 
by  John  the  Baptist,  the  Fourth  Evangelist 
omits  it ;  and  in  a  later  chapter  he  observes 
that  Jesus  Himself  did  not  baptise,  as  did 
His  disciples.  More  remarkable  still,  strange 
beyond  strangeness,  is  the  fact  that  in  de- 
scribing the  Last  Supper  the  Evangelist  does 
not  mention  the  solemn  partaking  of  bread 
and  wine,  with  the  immortal  words,  "  This  is 
my  body "  and  "  This  is  my  blood,"  which 
occur  in  the  Gospel  of  St  Mark,  nor  does 
he  say  a  word  about  that  institution  of  the 
Eucharist  as  a  rite,  which  is  spoken  of  by 
St  Paul  in  the  Corinthian  Epistle.  On  the 
contrary,  he  makes  the  main  feature  of  the 
Supper  to  consist  in  the  washing  by  the 
Master  of  the  disciples'  feet,  and  in  a  com- 
mand to  keep  up  this  custom  in  future  in  the 
Society. 

We  have  here  clearly  a  most  difficult  pro- 
blem ;  and  on  its  solution  must  largely  depend 
our  whole  view  of  the  purposes  and  tendencies 
of  the  writer. 

If  we  consider  the  time  and  the  place  of 
the  Evangelist's  writing,  we  cannot  doubt  that 
the  two   rites  of  baptism  and  the  Eucharist 


THE   SACRAMENTS  197 

were  in  practice  familiar  to  him.  We  learn 
from  Acts  and  the  Pauline  Epistles  how  early 
baptism  became  the  entrance  gate  of  the 
Church.  In  Acts  all  who  profess  the  simple 
creed  that  Jesus  is  the  Son  of  God  are  baptised 
into  the  name  of  Christ,  and  become  members 
of  the  Society.  The  Trinitarian  formula  in 
baptism  belongs  to  a  later  time.  The  com- 
mand at  the  end  of  the  First  Gospel  to  baptise 
the  nations  in  the  name  of  Father,  Son,  and 
Holy  Spirit  certainly  belongs  to  a  later  date 
than  that  to  which  it  is  assigned  in  Matthew, 
since  we  know  that  for  a  considerable  time 
after  the  crucifixion  there  was  no  question  of 
the  admission  of  all  nations  to  baptism,  and 
that  baptism  was  always  made  in  the  name  of 
Christ  only.  St  Paul,  as  he  informs  us,  seldom 
himself  baptised,  since  he  did  not  regard  that 
as  his  special  mission,  but  rather  preaching. 
But  he  fully  recognised  the  importance  of  the 
rite,  and,  in  his  own  fashion,  he  attached  to  it 
a  higher  and  spiritual  meaning,  "  buried  with 
Christ  in  baptism."  And  it  was  from  Ephesus 
that  the  exact  directions  of  St  Paul  as  to  the 
celebration  of  the  Lord's  Supper  were  sent  to 
the  Church  at  Corinth.  Thus  in  the  Church 
at  Ephesus,  when  the  Evangelist  wrote,  both 
rites,  of  baptism  into  Christ  and  of  the  Lord's 
Supper,   must   have    been    in    full    use,   and 


198  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

St  Paul's  higher  rendering  of  both  must  have 
been  familiar.  This  we  must  presuppose,  in 
considering  what  the  Evangelist  has  to  say  in 
regard  to  them. 

We  shall  find  that  his  treatment  of  them 
is  notable  in  two  respects.  First,  he  seems 
anxious  to  detach  them  from  historic  ante- 
cedents and  to  attach  them  to  great  spiritual 
facts  and  laws  of  the  higher  life.  And,  second, 
though  in  their  case  the  spirit  is  everything, 
yet  at  the  same  time  the  earthly  rendering  of 
the  spiritual  counts  for  something,  and  can 
hardly  be  dispensed  with. 

It  is  noteworthy  that  in  his  narrative  he 
does  not  lay  any  stress  on  the  historic  ante- 
cedents of  baptism.  John  the  Baptist  bears 
witness  to  the  descent  of  the  Spirit  upon 
Jesus.  In  the  Synoptists  this  descent  is  re- 
presented as  accompanying  the  baptism  of 
Jesus  by  John.  In  the  Fourth  Gospel,  how- 
ever, nothing  is  said  of  such  baptism :  it  is 
deliberately  omitted.  Critics  give  as  the 
reason  that  the  Evangelist  thinks  of  Jesus  as 
too  exalted  a  being  to  receive  baptism  from 
anyone.  And  in  Matthew  we  may  see  the 
germ  of  this  notion  in  the  saying  of  the 
Baptist,  "  I  have  need  to  be  baptised  of  Thee, 
and  comest  Thou  to  me  ? "  Still,  we  may 
observe  that  this  is  in  fact  an  example  of  the 


THE   SACRAMENTS  199 

Johannine  way  of  detaching  a  rite  from  historic 
event,  and  basing  it  on  doctrine  or  spiritual 
fact.    • 

In  one  place,  when  the  Evangelist  has  made 
an  unguarded  statement  that  Jesus  baptised 
more  disciples  than  John,  he  goes  back  on  it, 
and  explains  that  Jesus  did  not  Himself  baptise, 
but  the  disciples.  This  is  curious,  as  in  the 
Synoptists  we  have  no  record  of  Christian 
baptism  as  a  rite  until  we  come  to  the  com- 
mand, in  the  very  last  verses  of  Matthew,  to 
baptise  the  nations — a  passage  which,  as  we 
have  already  seen,  is  certainly  by  the  writer 
put  out  of  its  proper  date. 

In  the  Fourth  Evangelist's  account  of  the 
career  of  John  the  Baptist  we  have  a  clear 
statement  of  his  way  of  regarding  baptism. 
John  came  baptising  with  water,  and  he  is 
represented  as  himself  laying  stress  upon  the 
mere  outwardness  of  the  rite :  "  He  that  sent 
me  to  baptise  with  water,  He  said  unto  me, 
Upon  whomsoever  thou  shalt  see  the  Spirit 
descending  and  abiding  upon  him,  the  same 
is  he  that  baptiseth  with  the  Holy  Spirit." 
Baptism  with  the  Spirit  is  the  work  of  Jesus 
Christ,  and  this  is  of  immeasurably  greater 
value  than  mere  outward  baptism,  even  as  the 
person  of  Christ  is  immeasurably  greater  than 
that  of  John.     We  know  that  St  Paul  found 


200  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

at  Ephesus  a  set  of  persons  who  were  content 
to  be  disciples  of  the  Baptist :  this  gives  the 
more  point  to  the  Evangelist's  comparison. 
We  infer  that  the  disciples  of  the  Baptist  still 
existed  as  a  society  at  Ephesus,  and  that  they 
tried  to  combine  baptism  with  a  faith  essen- 
tially Jewish.  Probably  they  were  among 
the  Jews  who  grievously  disturbed  the  Church 
after  the  departure  of  St  Paul.  So  the 
Evangelist  contrasts  their  baptism,  which  was 
merely  an  external  rite,  with  the  Christian 
baptism  which  accompanied  an  illumination 
of  the  whole  being  by  means  of  the  Spirit. 

When  we  consider  the  tendency  of  the 
Evangelist  to  the  use  of  symbol  and  parable, 
we  must  allow  the  probability  of  the  view  of 
several  critics  that  the  Evangelist  intends  to 
introduce  an  allusion  to  it  into  the  miracle  of 
the  healing  of  the  man  born  blind.  Jesus 
anoints  his  eyes  with  clay,  thus  constituting  a 
tactual  relation  with  himself,  and  then  bids 
him  go  and  wash  in  the  pool  of  Siloam,  after 
which  he  receives  his  sight.  One  would  have 
thought  that  the  contact  with  Jesus  would 
be  sufficient ;  but  a  washing  or  baptism  is  also 
necessary.  We  may  well  see  here  an  expres- 
sion by  acted  parable  of  the  need  for  Christians 
not  only  that  their  hearts  should  be  touched 
by  faith  in  Christ,  but  that  they  should  go  on 


THE   SACRAMENTS  201 

to  the  rite  of  baptism,  after  which  there  will 
come  to  them  full  illumination.  At  the  same 
time,  -a  simpler  explanation,  that  the  Evan- 
gelist is  merely  repeating  details  handed  down 
to  him  by  the  separate  tradition,  is  quite  main- 
tainable. 

Anyone  who  reads  the  conversation  with 
Nicodemus  will  see  in  what  a  subordinate 
place  in  the  mind  of  the  writer  a  mere  out- 
ward rite  dwells.  The  Spirit  blows  where  it 
listeth,  in  ways  which  cannot  be  traced.  It 
is  only  of  Spirit  that  spirit  is  born,  and  it  is 
only  by  the  power  of  the  Spirit  that  a  man 
can  be  born  again.  The  idea  that  baptism  by 
itself  could  regenerate  would  be  to  the  writer 
as  monstrous  as  the  notion  of  Nicodemus 
that  a  man  must  enter  again  into  his  mother's 
womb.  Here,  as  in  all  parts  of  the  Gospel,  it 
is  the  Spirit  that  profiteth.  But  in  the  Church 
of  the  early  second  century,  baptism  held  a 
place  of  immense  importance.  It  was  the  open 
recognition  and  acceptance  of  Christianity. 
It  was  like  the  sacramentum  of  the  Roman 
soldier,  when  he  swore  to  be  loyal  to  the 
Emperor.  Hence  the  Evangelist  will  not 
depreciate  it.  A  man  must  be  born  of  water 
as  well  as  of  the  Spirit,  if  he  would  enter  into 
the  redeemed  Society. 

We  must,  of  course,  never  lose  sight  of  the 


202  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

fact  that  when  baptism  is  spoken  of  in  the 
New  Testament,  it  is  always  adult  baptism — 
baptism  accompanied  by  a  profession  of  faith, 
and  a  resolve  to  throw  in  one's  lot  with  the 
Society.  It  does  not  at  all  correspond  to 
infant  baptism,  which,  whether  right  or  wrong, 
stands  for  something  quite  different  from  a 
conscious  acceptance  of  Christ.  Far  more 
nearly  does  it  correspond  to  confirmation  in 
the  Roman  and  Anglican  Churches,  and  what 
is  called  "joining  the  Church  "  among  Dis- 
senters, or  "  conversion  "  in  the  case  of  such 
bodies  as  the  Salvation  Army.  It  accompanied 
a  serious  and  deliberate  decision  :  people  were 
not  baptised  in  order  that  they  might  become 
Christians,  but  in  order  that,  having  become 
Christians,  they  should  be  admitted  to  the 
rites  and  privileges  of  the  Society.  Relapse 
into  sin  after  baptism  was  regarded  as  so 
deadly  an  offence,  that  many  men  postponed 
baptism  to  a  late  period  in  their  lives  to  avoid 
the  danger. 

The  case  in  regard  to  the  Lord's  Supper 
runs  on  the  same  lines,  but  is  still  more  striking. 
It  seems  to  us  simply  astounding  that  if  the 
Evangelist  was  acquainted  with  the  rite,  he 
should  not  attach  it  to  the  Last  Supper,  which 
he  does  narrate.     M.  Loisy  1  says  that,  having 

1   Eludes  evange'liques,  p.  309. 


THE   SACRAMENTS  203 

already  in  his  sixth  chapter  drawn  attention 
to  the  spiritual  value  of  the  Communion,  the 
Evangelist  does  not  think  it  necessary,  when 
he  describes  the  Last  Supper,  to  narrate  its 
historic  foundation,  but  substitutes  the  rite  of 
feet-washing,  which  has  really  much  of  the 
same  meaning.  This  is,  however,  not  a  satis- 
factory explanation  of  the  Evangelist's  writing. 
The  washing  of  the  feet  of  the  brethren  was  to 
be  a  practical  lesson  in  the  duty  of  humility  and 
self-abasement.  It  is  parallel  to  the  Pauline 
exhortation,1  "  in  lowliness  of  mind  each  count- 
ing other  better  than  himself."  The  beautiful 
impulse,  and  the  illustration  of  a  moral  lesson 
by  a  sort  of  acted  parable,  are  quite  in  the 
manner  of  Jesus  ;  and  we  can  scarcely  doubt 
that  we  have  here  a  genuine  Apostolic  tradi- 
tion of  what  took  place  at  all  events  at  some 
meal  when  the  Master  and  the  Apostles  were 
together.  But  this  lesson  of  humility  is  quite 
different  from  the  higher  meaning  of  the 
Eucharistic  feast,  rich  with  the  inherited 
traditions  of  many  generations,  which  had  all 
felt  how  a  sacramental  repast  may  be  a  means 
of  bringing  together  the  human  and  the  Divine. 
Why  should  not  the  Evangelist  have  intro- 
duced into  his  narrative  both  the  washing  of 
feet  and  the  sayings  as  to  the  body  and  the 
1  Phil  ii.  3. 


204  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

blood  ?  It  may  be  said  that  he  does  not  care 
to  repeat  what  might  at  the  time  be  read  in 
the  Gospel  of  Mark.  But  everyone  will  feel 
that  this  explanation  is  insufficient.  The 
Gospel  of  Mark  was  not  then  familiar,  as  the 
Gospels  are  now  familiar,  through  the  printed 
version.  The  Evangelist  might  surely  have 
enlarged  the  bare  outline  of  Mark  with  fuller 
and  more  spiritual  meaning.  It  is  scarcely 
possible  to  find  any  other  reason  for  his  pro- 
ceeding, except  his  desire  to  detach  the  higher 
Christian  teaching  from  mere  occasion  of 
history,  and  instead  to  attach  it  to  the  eternal 
realities  of  the  spiritual  world.  To  the  Synop- 
tists  the  Lord's  Supper  is  a  commemorative 
rite :  the  Fourth  Evangelist  seems  to  foresee 
its  function  in  the  Church  of  the  future,  as 
something  much  greater  than  a  mere  com- 
memorative rite. 

That  the  Evangelist,  when  he  wrote  his 
sixth  chapter,  had  in  his  mind  the  Christian 
rite  of  Communion  seems  to  be  certain.  It 
is  in  fact  made  quite  clear  by  his  mention 
both  of  the  body  and  the  blood  of  the  Lord. 
Body  and  blood  are  thus  put  together  in  the 
Pauline  and  Synoptic  version  of  the  Com- 
munion, and  it  is  beyond  dispute  that  the 
Evangelist  was  familiar  with  that  version. 
If  he  had  been  historically  minded,  we  might 


THE   SACRAMENTS  205 

regard  his  account  of  the  JLast  Supper  as 
intended  to  deny  the  historicity  of  that  version. 
But  he  is  not  historically  minded :  history  is 
to  him  merely  a  setting  in  time  and  space 
of  the  Divine  ideas  ;  and  he  feels  quite  at 
liberty  to  embody  them,  not  in  history,  but 
in  doctrine. 

Thus  the  rite  as  it  existed  in  his  time 
suggested  to  him  the  spiritual  doctrine  of 
eating  the  flesh  and  drinking  the  blood  of 
Christ :  that  is  to  say,  continuing  in  the  world 
the  divine  obedience  of  Christ.  "  My  meat," 
the  Johannine  Jesus  says,  "is  to  do  the  will 
of  Him  that  sent  me."  But  this  doing  of  the 
will  of  God  can  only  come  from  imbibing  the 
spirit  of  Christ.  "  If  any  man  thirst,  let  him 
come  unto  Me  and  drink."  A  figurative  use 
of  the  language  as  to  eating  and  drinking  is 
found  in  the  book  of  Ecclesiasticus  (xxiv.  21), 
where  Wisdom  says,  "  Those  who  eat  me  will 
always  hunger  for  me  again ;  those  who  drink 
me  will  always  again  thirst  for  me."  It  is  by 
being  born  into  the  spirit  of  Christ,  and  living 
with  His  life,  that  men  become  branches  of  the 
Vine.  Then  the  life  of  the  Vine  shall  be  their 
life.  Their  life  on  earth  shall  be  part  of  the 
life  of  Christ,  and  shall  complete  the  work 
which  He  did  in  the  world,  in  subordinating 
His  human  will  to  the  Divine  will. 


206  THE   EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

Because  Christians  can  be  helped  to  do  this 
by  the  Christian  Communion,  it  is  justified  : 
but  in  itself  it  is  indifferent.  This  feeling  the 
Evangelist  puts  in  the  strongest  form  in  the 
next  paragraph  in  the  words,  "  It  is  the  spirit 
that  quickeneth ;  the  flesh  profiteth  nothing : 
the  words  that  I  have  spoken  to  you  are  spirit 
and  are  life."  It  is  his  usual  plan,  when  he 
has  said  anything  which  may  tend  to  confirm 
ritualism,  thus  to  supplement  it  with  an  anti- 
dote. In  the  same  way,  after  referring  to 
Baptism,  he  inserts  the  verse  as  to  the  untrace- 
able action  of  the  Spirit,  which  may,  indeed, 
come  with  baptism,  of  course  adult  baptism, 
but  may  also  come  in  any  other  way. 

On  the  Jews,  who  take  the  words  of  eating 
the  body  and  the  blood  in  a  literal  sense,  he 
pours  out  the  vials  of  his  contempt  and  ridicule. 
The  Jews  find  the  saying  as  interpreted  to 
them  by  Jesus  in  the  later  context  a  hard 
one :  and  here  the  Evangelist  is  thinking  of 
his  own  contemporaries,  who  find  a  difficulty  in 
comprehending  and  receiving  spiritual  teach- 
ing in  regard  to  the  Eucharist.  No  doubt 
many  of  the  converts  at  Ephesus  would 
carry  into  Christianity  the  materialist  and 
ritualist  notions  to  which  they  were  ac- 
customed in  the  Pagan  Mysteries.  Those 
Mysteries  were  never  able  completely  to  sever 


THE   SACRAMENTS  207 

themselves  from  magic :  that  is,  the  mystae 
usually  attached  a  mysterious  efficacy  to  the 
mere  act  of  partaking,  apart  from  the  motion 
of  will  and  heart  which  really  gave  it  the 
possibility  of  being  efficacious.  After  the 
Evangelist  has  shown  the  Jewish,  that  is,  the 
materialist  way  of  regarding  the  Eucharist, 
he  puts  in  the  mouth  of  St  Peter,  as  the 
typical  Christian,  a  strong  corrective.  Jesus 
said  to  the  twelve,  "  Would  ye  also  go  away  ?  " 
And  Peter  answered,  "  Lord,  to  whom  shall 
we  go  ?  Thou  hast  the  words  of  eternal  life." 
As  I  show  in  another  chapter,  this  phrase 
"  words  of  eternal  life  "  does  not  refer  merely 
to  teaching  by  precept  or  parable,  but  to  the 
inner  teaching  of  the  Divine  Spirit,  stirring 
in  the  hearts  of  the  disciples.  It  may  seem  a 
violent  interpretation,  when  the  Evangelist 
says  "  The  Jews,"  to  interpret  him  as  mean- 
ing any  literalist,  whether  Jew  or  Gentile ; 
but  it  is  clear  that  he  uses  the  word  in  this 
sense  in  passage  after  passage.  At  any  rate 
"  the  Jews "  are  opponents  of  the  truth,  and 
not  convinced  adherents.  It  is  not  an  explana- 
tion of  one  of  the  great  Christian  mysteries  to 
an  inner  circle  that  we  have  in  the  text,  but 
a  broad  statement  of  the  Christian  attitude 
towards  the  Saviour. 

There  is  a  very  close  parallel  between  the 


208  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

discourse  of  the  sixth  chapter,  and  the  con- 
versation in  the  fourth  with  the  woman  of 
Samaria.  The  bread  which  came  down  from 
heaven,  in  the  one  discourse,  is  exactly  parallel 
to  the  living  water,  which  is  a  flowing  spring 
of  life  in  a  man,  in  the  other  discourse.  In 
both,  the  stupidity  and  materialism  of  the 
auditors  is  used  as  a  foil  to  bring  out  the 
noble  spirituality  of  the  teaching.  In  both, 
the  moral  is  exactly  the  same — the  salvation 
of  men  through  partaking  of  the  life  in  Christ. 
But  in  the  discourse  to  the  woman  there  is 
no  allusion  to  the  Christian  Communion.  Nor 
is  there  any  allusion  to  Baptism,  since  the 
water  is  taken  inwardly,  and  not  outwardly, 
to  quench  thirst,  and  not  to  purify.  All  this 
shows  the  mind  of  the  Evangelist  in  regard 
to  the  Sacraments.  They  were  useful  to  the 
Church,  and  accepted  as  a  matter  of  course. 
But  their  whole  validity  was  spiritual,  and 
there  was  in  fact  a  great  danger  that  they 
should  be  practised  simply  in  obedience  to  a 
command  of  the  Founder,  or  regarded  as 
having  any  intrinsic  or  magical  value. 

In  the  mind  of  the  Christians  of  the  second 
and  third  centuries  there  was  a  close  connec- 
tion between  the  miraculous  feeding  of  the 
multitude   by   the   sea    of    Galilee1   and   the 

1  John,  chap.  vi. 


THE   SACRAMENTS  209 

Christian  Communion.  This  we  see  alike 
from  early  Christian  writings  and  the  paint- 
ings of  the  Roman  Catacombs.  In  the  case 
of  the  latter  it  is  even  difficult  to  tell  whether 
the  primary  reference  of  the  painting  is  to  the 
miracle  or  the  Communion.  But  that  this 
connection  was  intended  by  the  Fourth  Evan- 
gelist is  not  clear.  The  miracle  itself  no  doubt 
came  down  to  him  by  tradition.  But  in  the 
comment  on  it  which  he  assigns  to  Jesus, 
"  Work  not  for  the  meat  which  perisheth,  but 
for  the  meat  which  abideth  unto  eternal  life, 
which  the  Son  of  Man  shall  give  unto  you," 
it  is  very  doubtful  if  there  is  an  allusion  to  the 
Sacrament;  the  meat" which  abideth  is  in  the 
context  explained  to  be  belief  in  the  divine 
mission  of  the  Son  of  Man,  or  faith.  It  is 
true  that  in  the  verses  which  follow  there  is 
allusion  to  the  Communion,  but  it  is  connected 
not  with  the  feeding  of  the  multitude,  but 
with  the  manna  which  fell  on  the  Israelites 
from  heaven.  It  was  very  natural  that  as  the 
idea  of  the  Communion  became  more  material- 
ist, the  comparison  of  it  to  the  miraculous 
feeding  should  arise.  But  it  is  more  than 
doubtful  whether  this  was  the  intention  of  the 
Evangelist. 

Another  point  dwelt  on  by  the  Evangelist 

is  the   contagious   character   of  the   spiritual 

14 


210  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

life.1  "  He  that  belie veth  on  Me,  as  the 
Scripture  hath  said,  out  of  his  body  shall 
flow  rivers  of  living  water."  Any  member 
of  the  Society  who  has  received  the  Divine 
inspiration,  and  felt  within  him  the  impulses 
of  the  higher  life,  becomes  a  source  of  inspira- 
tion to  others.  Surely  this  is  in  accordance 
with  Christian  experience. 

Nevertheless,  the  conscience  of  the  Church 
has  been  right  in  regarding  the  Evangelist 
as  the  advocate  and  apostle  of  the  Christian 
Sacraments.  There  is  in  him,  curiously  inter- 
twined with  his  superb  spirituality,  a  keen 
recognition  that  after  all  man  is  not  pure 
spirit,  and  that  to  have  full  effect  spiritual 
teaching  must  be  combined  with  the  visible 
and  material. 

We  may  compare  the  first  few  verses  of  the 
Gospel.  In  the  prologue,  where  the  spiritual 
doctrine  of  the  Logos  is  set  forth  with  so  much 
simplicity  and  nobility,  the  teaching  diverges 
from  that  of  the  spiritual  heathen  and  the 
Gnostic  by  the  insertion  of  the  strong  phrase, 
"  The  Word  was  made  flesh."  The  writer 
does  not  say  the  Word  became  tenant  of  a 
human  body,  and  lived  for  a  while  on  the 
earth :  the  phrase  is  far  stronger — the  Word 
became    flesh    (sctrx).      In    the    Epistles    of 

1  vii.  38. 


THE   SACRAMENTS  211 

St  Paul  the  word  flesh  means  more  than 
body — it  means  the  materiality  of  the  body. 
"  Flesh  and  blood,"  says  St  Paul,  "  cannot 
inherit  the  Kingdom  of  God " :  before  that 
Kingdom  comes  men  must  put  off  the  carnal 
body  and  assume  a  spiritual  body.  "  The 
spirit,"  he  says,  "is  in  constant  warfare  against 
the  flesh  "  ;  and  he  gives  a  long  list  of  foul 
vices  which  are  the  natural  works  of  the  flesh. 
According  to  the  teaching  of  the  mystic  sects 
of  Asia,  the  flesh  was  the  principle  of  evil, 
and  irreconcilably  hostile  to  all  goodness. 
Thus  the  phrase  "  the  Word  became  flesh " 
is  a  very  extreme  utterance,  and  one  which 
must  have  greatly  scandalised  the  Christians 
of  Ephesus. 

This  real  mixing  of  the  Divine  and  the 
human  is  the  Christian  doctrine  of  the  In- 
carnation, as  contrasted  with  the  Gnostic 
doctrine  that  the  Divine  and  the  human  could 
have  no  direct  contact — moved  in  different 
spheres.  Augustine,  after  studying  the  nobler 
forms  of  Pagan  mysticism,  selects  this  one 
Christian  teaching  as  that  which  is  not  to  be 
found  injtKem.  It  is  the  Johannine  equivalent 
of  the  quasi -historical  story  of  Matthew  and 
Luke  of  the  Virgin  Birth.  This  is  quite  in 
accordance  with  the  regular  order  in  the  rise 
of  religious  teaching.     First  comes  history  or 


212  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

myth  (for  in  ancient  times  the  two  were 
scarcely  distinguished),  and  afterwards  doctrine. 
In  the  same  way,  the  Christian  doctrine 
of  the  Sacraments,  as  set  forth  by  the  Evan- 
gelist, is  pure  spirituality  humanised.  In  it 
there  is  no  trace  of  the  magical :  that  a  mere 
rite  by  itself  could  draw  down  the  Divine 
power,  or  lift  up  the  human  spirit,  the  Evan- 
gelist would  have  denied  as  keenly  as  St  Paul. 
"  It  is  the  spirit  that  quickeneth ;  the  flesh 
proflteth  nothing."  Yet  the  Word  was  made 
flesh :  the  drama  of  salvation  had  to  be  ex- 
hibited on  the  theatre  of  time  and  space. 
The  Divine  Spirit  must  dwell  in  a  mortal 
body,  must  suffer  and  must  pass  through 
death,  that  men  also  may  learn  to  conquer 
suffering  and  death  by  the  power  of  the  Spirit 
within  them.  In  the  same  way  the  baptism 
with  the  Holy  Ghost  may  be  accompanied 
by  a  visible  baptism  of  water;  and  the  im- 
parting to  believers  of  the  life  and  spirit  of 
Christ  may  be  accompanied  and  symbolised 
by  the  rite  of  the  Eucharist.  It  was  the 
business  of  the  Church,  by  its  organisation, 
to  preserve  the  outward  and  visible  sign,  and 
to  trust  to  its  continued  inspiration  that  the 
inward  and  spiritual  grace  would,  when  and 
how  it  pleased  the  will  of  God,  accompany 
the  sign.     If  that  grace  were  taken  from  the 


THE   SACRAMENTS  213 

Church,  then  no  doubt  the  rite  would  be 
empty  and  worthless.  That  the  grace  would 
continue  the  Church  could  not  guarantee, 
but  she  could  at  least  provide  a  suitable  occa- 
sion and  vehicle.  The  Church  set  up  the  rite 
as  a  man  may  set  on  his  house  a  lightning- 
conductor,  when  he  does  not  know  whether 
the  lightning  will  ever  come  that  way.  Such 
seems  to  be  the  sacramental  teaching  of  the 
Evangelist,  remote  alike  from  the  materialism 
of  those  who  regard  the  rite  as  in  itself 
efficacious,  and  the  unhealthy  spirituality  of 
those  who  regard  the  rite  as  superfluous  and 
indifferent. 

In  his  old  age,  when  he  wrote  the  Epistle, 
the  Evangelist  seems  to  have  relied,  as  was 
natural  to  a  man  with  failing  powers,  some- 
what more  on  the  visible  rites  of  the  Church. 
"  There  are  three,"  he  writes,1  "  who  bear 
witness,  the  Spirit,  and  the  water,  and  the 
blood."  The  Spirit  in  the  Church  is  always 
the  true  source  of  inspiration  and  life ;  but 
there  are  associated  with  the  Spirit  the  water 
of  baptism  and  the  blood  of  the  Christian 
Communion. 

1   Epistle  v.  8. 


X 

JUDAISM   AND    THE   GOSPEL 

In  treating  of  the  relation  of  the  Fourth 
Evangelist  to  Jewish  race  and  tradition,  we 
must  be  careful  not  to  confuse  different  things. 
First,  there  is  the  broad  question  of  univer- 
salism,  whether  those  who  belonged  to  other 
races  than  the  Jewish  might,  by  piety  and  by 
following  the  divine  light  in  their  own  religions, 
be  acceptable  to  God,  or  whether  God  would 
accept  the  Jews  only.  This  question  must,  in 
a  country  of  mixed  inhabitants  such  as  Galilee, 
have  sometimes  arisen  in  the  lifetime  of 
the  Founder;  and  we  shall  see  that  accord- 
ing to  the  Gospels  it  did  sometimes  arise. 
After  the  crucifixion,  when  the  Church  as  an 
organised  body  was  coming  into  existence, 
this  question  was  naturally  merged  in  another : 
whether  the  Gentiles  could  be  admitted  into 
the  Society  without  becoming  proselytes  and 
keeping  at  least  some  of  the  precepts  of  the 

214 


JUDAISM    AND   THE    GOSPEL  215 

Law  of  Moses.     This  was  the  question  which 
it  was  the  mission  of  St  Paul  to  solve. 

What  makes  it  as  difficult  as  it  is  important 
to  keep  these  two  questions  apart  is  the  fact 
that  in  the  Fourth  Gospel,  and  in  a  less 
degree  in  the  First  and  Third,  there  is  a 
certain  confusion  of  tenses.  The  life  of  the 
Founder  is  in  a  measure  reconstructed  in 
view  of  the  experiences  of  the  rising  Society. 
That  this  should  be  so  was  inevitable.  M. 
Paul  Sabatier  has  shown  how  the  life  of  St 
Francis  was,  within  a  few  years  of  his  death, 
rewritten  in  view  of  the  problems  which  came 
before  the  society  which  he  had  founded.  In 
the  same  way,  the  controversies  of  the  time  of 
Paul  are  sometimes  reflected  in  the  narrative 
of  the  Gospels. 

It  is  by  no  means  easy  to  determine  what 
was  the  teaching  of  Jesus  Himself  in  regard 
to  the  racial  question.  On  the  one  hand,  we 
have  His  harsh  speech  to  the  Syro-Phcenician 
woman — a  speech  recorded  by  Mark,  which 
is  regarded  as  bearing  marks  of  authenticity : 
"  It  is  not  meet  to  take  the  children's  bread 
and  cast  it  to  the  dogs."  Matthew  in  the 
same  connection  reports  another  saying  of 
Jesus :  "I  was  not  sent  but  unto  the  lost 
sheep  of  the  house  of  Israel."  I  suppose  that 
every  Christian  reads  these  words  with  some 


216  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

pain.  Interpreters  have  many  ways  of  blunt- 
ing their  keenness :  but  however  they  be 
explained,  they  can  scarcely  be  received  with 
complacency.  Nor  does  the  saying  stand  alone. 
When  Matthew  records  the  calling  of  the 
Twelve,  he  adds1  that  Jesus  gave  them  the 
direction,  "  Go  not  into  any  way  of  the  Gentiles, 
and  enter  not  into  any  city  of  the  Samaritans  ; 
but  go  rather  to  the  lost  sheep  of  the  house 
of  Israel."  In  face  of  such  passages  it  seems 
impossible  to  deny  that  for  some  reason,  at 
all  events  at  some  time  in  His  life,  the 
Founder  of  Christianity  restricted  His  mission 
to  the  Jews  and  the  Proselytes.  But  in  con- 
trast with  these  passages  we  find  others  of  a 
very  different  strain.  Even  John  the  Baptist 
is  represented  as  saying  to  his  followers,  "  God 
is  able  of  these  stones  to  raise  up  children 
unto  Abraham."2  And  in  the  passage  which 
relates  to  the  healing  of  the  Roman  Cen- 
turion's servant,  Jesus  praises  the  faith  of  the 
Centurion,  and  adds,  "  Many  shall  come  from 
the  east  and  the  west,  and  shall  sit  down  with 
Abraham  and  Isaac  and  Jacob  in  the  Kingdom 
of  Heaven."  As  I  have  observed,  it  is  not 
easy  to  reconcile  these  sayings.  It  is  of 
course  easy  to  say  that  in  the  former  of  them 
Jesus  is  only  trying  the  faith  of  the  woman, 
1  Matt.  x.  5.  2  Matt,  m  g 


JUDAISM    AND   THE   GOSPEL  217 

believing  it  to  be  strong  enough  to  bear  the 
test.  And  it  is  not  difficult  to  suppose  that 
the  saying  to  the  Centurion  is  transposed  by 
the  Evangelist  under  the  influence  of  the  flow 
of  Greeks  into  the  Society.  If  so,  this  saying- 
illustrates  the  extreme  difficulty  of  discerning 
between  the  actual  sayings  of  the  Founder  of 
Christianity  and  the  results  of  the  working  of 
His  Spirit  in  the  nascent  Church. 

The  truth  is  that  the  teaching  of  Jesus,  as 
recorded  by  the  Synoptic  writers,  lies  so  close 
to  the  heart  of  human  nature,  beneath  the 
externals  of  nation  and  training,  that  it  would 
seem  to  be  quite  inconsistent  with  any  ex- 
clusive racial  feeling."  And  it  is  clear  that 
Jesus  not  only  Himself  kept  the  law  rather  in 
the  spirit  than  in  the  letter,  but  also  encouraged 
His  disciples  to  do  the  same.  The  religion 
bore  from  the  very  first  obviously  the  potenti- 
ality of  becoming  a  world-religion,  although 
the  Apostles  seem  to  have  been  slow  to  recog- 
nise this  fact.  Thus  St  Paul,  in  insisting  on 
the  admission  of  the  Gentiles  to  the  Church 
on  equal  terms,  was  certainly  following  the 
line  impressed  by  his  Master  on  the  new 
religion. 

But  in  another  way  the  teaching  of  St  Paul 
marks  a  retrogression  in  liberality.  For  him 
the  new  sacred  Society  steps  into  the  place  of 


218  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

the  old  racial  Church.  Jew  and  Gentile  are  one 
in  Christ.  But  it  does  not  seem  that  St  Paul 
recognised  any  regular  way  of  salvation  apart 
from  incorporation  in  the  Church  of  Christ. 
When  Luke  puts  into  the  mouth  of  Peter  the 
words,  "  Of  a  truth  I  perceive  that  God  is  no 
respecter  of  persons ;  but  in  every  nation  he 
that  feareth  Him,  and  worketh  righteousness, 
is  acceptable  to  Him,"  he  gives  utterance  to  a 
view  which  goes  somewhat  beyond  what  St 
Paul  could  have  accepted.  The  teaching  is 
quite  in  a  line  with  the  utterance  in  Matthew 
xxv.,  where  feeding  the  hungry  and  tending 
the  sick  is  represented  as  the  way  of  life.  St 
Paul,  however,  would  have  maintained  that 
that  life  can  be  reached  only  through  the  gate 
of  faith,  not  through  that  of  good  works, 
though  we  have  in  Romans  ii.  1-16  a  some- 
what different  strain. 

It  may  be  said  that  when  St  Paul  says  that 
Abraham  was  saved  by  faith,  he  must  have 
been  thinking  of  faith  in  the  God  of  Israel, 
not  God  as  revealed  in  Christ.  It  may  be  so  : 
St  Paul  often  falls  into  inconsistencies,  as  do 
most  great  theologians,  because  the  particular 
point  which  they  are  considering  absorbs  their 
attention  and  draws  it  away  from  all  else.  In 
the  passage  cited  he  is  contrasting  faith  with 
works,  and  not  thinking  of  the  object  of  faith. 


JUDAISM    AND   THE   GOSPEL  219 

But  the  inconsistency  is  only  verbal,  and  did 
not  exist  in  the  mind  of  St  Paul,  to  whom 
history*  was  not  a  mere  succession  of  events  in 
time,  but  the  reflection  of  spiritual  facts.  "  In 
Adam,"  he  says,  "  all  die."1  He  would  no 
doubt  have  agreed  with  the  phrase  of  the 
Evangelist,  "  Your  father  Abraham  rejoiced 
to  see  my  day ;  and  he  saw  it,  and  was  glad." 
So  that  Abraham  also  had  faith  in  Christ. 

Thus  the  Pauline  teaching  continued,  in  an 
infinitely  loftier  and  more  spiritual  way,  the 
teaching  of  a  privileged  and  chosen  people, 
though  the  Israel  in  which  he  believed  was 
not  a  race  but  a  society,  united  to  its  divine 
Head,  and  thence  deriving  all  its  power  and 
all  its  happiness. 

In  the  Fourth  Gospel  we  find  in  regard  to 
this  matter  three  elements.  There  is  some 
trace,  due  no  doubt  to  an  Apostolic  tradition, 
of  the  relations  of  the  Founder  of  Christianity 
to  Jewish  law,  and  His  impatience  of  it. 
There  is  a  general  acceptance  of  the  Pauline 
point  of  view — of  salvation  through  Christ 
alone.  Also  there  is  something  of  a  ten- 
dency to  spiritual  universalism,  which  belongs 
to  the  Evangelist  himself,  but  which  is,  in 
fact,  a  development  of  the  attitude  of  the 
Founder. 

1   1  Cor.  xv.  22.     The  tense  is  present. 


220  THE   EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

The  Pauline  doctrine  of  salvation  by  faith 
lies  so  deeply  at  the  root  of  the  teaching  of 
the  Fourth  Gospel,  and  is  so  fully  implied  in 
all  its  developments,  that  we  need  not  dwell 
in  this  place  on  the  dependence  on  it  of  the 
Johannine  teaching.  What  is  more  necessary 
is  to  show  that,  in  spite  of  this  fact,  the  Evan- 
gelist stretches  out  towards  universalism  with 
an  energy  which  sometimes  leads  him  into 
inconsistency.  We  may  begin  by  citing  two 
passages,  "  Other  sheep  I  have,  which  are  not 
of  this  fold,"  and  "  He  prophesied  that  Jesus 
should  die  for  the  nation ;  and  not  for  the 
nation  only,  but  that  He  might  also  gather 
together  into  one  the  children  of  God  that 
are  scattered  abroad,"  in  which  there  is  some- 
thing of  the  universalist  spirit.  But  both  these 
passages  seem,  on  a  careful  examination,  to 
refer  only  to  the  admission  of  Gentiles  into  the 
Church,  not  to  the  validity  of  Gentile  faith 
and  works  outside  the  Church. 

In  some  passages  of  the  Gospel,  however, 
we  have  distinct  allusions  not  so  much  to  the 
admission  of  Gentiles  to  the  Church  as  to  the 
reality  of  religion  outside  the  Church.  The 
event  mentioned  in  xii.  20,  the  desire  of  some  of 
the  Greeks — Hellenes,  not  Hellenistic  Jews — 
who  were  in  Jerusalem  at  a  festival  to  speak 
to   Jesus,  seems   quite   likely  to  be   historic. 


JUDAISM   AND  THE   GOSPEL  221 

The  fact  is  told  simply,  and  it  is  added  that 
Jesus  was  pleased  at  the  recognition :  He 
makes  the  very  simple  and  natural  remark, 
"  The  time  has  come  for  the  Son  of  Man  to 
be  held  in  honour,"  and  recognised  not  only 
by  his  countrymen.  The  English  version, 
"  should  be  glorified,"  takes  the  mind  of  the 
reader  away,  by  seeming  to  refer  to  some 
divine  exaltation.  And  it  seems  very  prob- 
able that  the  Evangelist  looked  on  the  simple 
phrase  which  he  had  heard  from  tradition  in  a 
symbolic  way,  for  he  adds  a  little  discourse,  in 
his  usual  manner,  transposing  the  simple  events 
of  every  day  into  a  loftier  key.  This  discourse, 
beginning,  "  Except  a  grain  of  wheat  fall  into 
the  earth  and  die,  it  abideth  by  itself  alone ; 
but  if  it  die,  it  beareth  much  fruit,"  is  one  of 
superb  spirituality,  but  it  is  in  no  way  appro- 
priate to  the  context. 

The  Fourth  Evangelist,  though  he  was 
probably  a  Jew  by  race,  carries  further  even 
than  St  Paul  the  emancipation  from  Judaic 
nationalism  and  exclusiveness.  To  St  Paul 
the  Christian  Church  seemed  to  step  into  the 
place  in  the  Divine  favour  and  purposes  held 
by  the  Jewish  people :  the  Jewish  law  was 
not  binding  upon  Gentile  Christians,  but  they 
inherited  the  rich  promises  made  to  the  Jewish 
Patriarchs,  and  became  a  new  and  true  Israel. 


222  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

Luke,  in  the  tale  of  the  conversion  of  Cornelius, 
shows  how  by  prayer  and  piety  a  Roman 
might  come  as  near  to  the  door  of  the  King- 
dom of  God  as  a  pious  Jew.  The  writer  of 
the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  shows  how  Jewish 
belief  and  ritual  was  a  symbolical  anticipation 
of  the  faith  and  the  practice  of  the  Christian 
Church.  But  the  Fourth  Evangelist  in  places 
goes  further  than  any  of  these. 

Nowhere  does  his  spiritual  universalism 
shine  more  brightly  than  in  the  discourse  to 
the  Samaritan  woman,  which  we  naturally 
bring  into  close  contrast  with  the  Matthean 
saying,  "  Into  any  city  of  the  Samaritans  enter 
ye  not."  He  makes  a  slight  concession,  "  We 
worship  what  we  know,  for  salvation  is  from 
the  Jews."  But  immediately  he  is  borne  away 
on  the  flood  of  a  magnificent  universalism, 
"  The  hour  cometh,  and  now  is,  when  the  true 
worshippers  shall  worship  the  Father  in  spirit 
and  in  truth :  for  such  doth  the  Father  seek 
to  be  his  worshippers."  The  exclusive  privi- 
lege of  the  temple  and  Jerusalem  is  at  an  end  : 
all  races  may  come  to  God,  and  worship  Him 
where  they  please,  so  long  as  it  is  a  spiritual 
worship  which  they  bring.  Until  one  has 
fully  realised  what  Jerusalem  was  to  the  Jews, 
how  completely  it  represented  their  national 
religion,  their  pride  of  race,  their  past  history, 


JUDAISM    AND   THE   GOSPEL  223 

and  their  hopes  for  the  future,  one  cannot 
fully  understand  at  what  a  cost  of  self-sup- 
pression and  through  what  painful  following 
of  the  higher  light  any  Hebrew  could  reach 
that  utterance.  When  the  author  of  the 
Apocalypse  writes  of  the  future,  his  highest  hope 
is  to  see  a  new  Jerusalem :  the  Evangelist 
is  willing  to  see  Jerusalem  for  ever  eclipsed. 
No  doubt  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem  by 
Titus  had  violently  wrenched  aside  much  of 
the  Jewish  hope  in  the  city  of  God  ;  but  such 
a  complete  carrying  on  of  the  tendency  of 
Jesus  towards  spiritual  universalism  could 
only  come  from  His  Spirit  still  working  in 
the  Church. 

I  have  spoken  of  the  noble  spirituality  of 
this  passage  as  belonging  to  the  Evangelist. 
In  its  actual  expression,  no  doubt  it  does 
belong  to  him.  The  choice  of  words  and 
the  literary  style  are  his.  And  in  the  Gospel 
it  is  represented  as  part  of  a  discourse  held 
between  two  persons  only,  Jesus  and  the 
Samaritan  woman,  the  disciples  having  gone 
away  into  the  town  to  buy  food.  Who  then 
could  report  it  ?  The  discourse  of  Jesus 
gradually  slides  away  from  the  connection  in 
which  it  began,  and  ends  with  preaching  such 
as  the  Evangelist  may  well  have  uttered  in 
the  Synagogue  at  Ephesus,  "  God  is  spirit,  and 


224  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

they  that  worship  Him  must  worship  in  spirit 
and  truth."  One  cannot  but  feel  how  in- 
appropriate such  a  sublime  utterance  would 
be  when  addressed  to  the  Samaritan  woman, 
who  is  represented  as  a  very  commonplace  and 
even  crass  person. 

Yet  the  discourse  is  but  a  further  projection 
of  the  line  marked  out  by  the  historic  Jesus. 
In  the  sober  and  unimaginative  record  of  the 
trial  before  the  High  Priest  which  Mark  gives 
us,  we  observe  that  one  of  the  most  telling 
accusations  against  Jesus  was  one  brought  by 
witnesses  who  said,  "  We  heard  him  say,  I  will 
destroy  this  temple  that  is  made  with  hands, 
and  in  three  days  I  will  build  another  made 
without  hands."1  But  the  Evangelist  adds 
that  the  witnesses  did  not  agree  as  to  what 
had  really  been  said.  It  is  notable  that  there 
is  an  exactly  corresponding  want  of  agreement 
between  our  authorities  who  report  these  say- 
ings of  Jesus.  Matthew  (xxiv.  1)  tells  us 
that  when  the  disciples  of  Jesus  showed  Him 
the  splendour  of  the  temple,  he  replied,  "  There 
shall  not  be  left  here  one  stone  upon  another," 
alluding  doubtless  to  the  destruction  of  the 
city  which  he  foresaw.  But  John  reports  a 
saying   much   nearer   to    the    words    of    the 

1  Compare  2  Cor.  v.  l,"We  have  a  building  from  God, 
a  house  not  made  with  hands,  eternal  in  the  hea\ 


JUDAISM    AND   THE   GOSPEL  225 

witnesses,  "  Destroy  this  temple,  and  in  three 
days  I  will  raise  it  up."  Evidently  the 
bystanders,  or  those  who  repeated  these  words 
later,  did  not  understand  them.  The  Fourth 
Evangelist  says  that  the  real  meaning  was 
that  Jesus  "  spake  of  the  temple  of  His  body," 
and  that  afterwards,  when  Jesus  arose  from 
the  dead,  the  disciples  remembered  the  saying. 
But  there  can  be  little  doubt  that  if  on  some 
occasions,  as  Matthew  reports,  Jesus  spoke  only 
of  the  comingdestructionof  the  temple,  on  other 
occasions  he  spoke  of  that  temple  as  having 
become  superfluous  owing  to  the  new  teaching 
of  the  Kingdom  of  -God.  Thus  the  germ  of 
the  saying  of  the  Fourth  Evangelist,  that  the 
true  worship  of  God  was  independent  of  place, 
may  be  found  in  the  historic  teaching  of  Jesus. 
Only  the  phrase  "  God  is  spirit "  is  too  meta- 
physical ever  to  have  been  uttered  in  that 
teaching. 

Also  belonging  entirely  to  the  Evangelist  is 
the  noble  passage  in  the  proem,  in  which  the 
Word  is  spoken  of  as  a  light  lighting  every 
man  who  comes  into  the  world.  And  else- 
where in  the  Gospel,  Jesus  is  represented  as 
saying  that  He  is  the  light  of  the  world,  not, 
be  it  observed,  the  light  of  the  Church.  In 
fact,  we  have  here  an  approximation  to  the 

lofty,  though  too  intellectualised,  universalism 

15 


226  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

of  Justin,1  in  the  next  generation,  who  writes  : 
"  He  is  the  Word  of  whom  every  race  of  men 
were  partakers ;  and  those  who  lived  reason- 
ably are  Christians,  even  though  they  have 
been  thought  atheists."  "  Even  they  who 
lived  before  Christ,  and  lived  without  reason, 
were  wicked  and  hostile  to  Christ." 

In  speaking  of  the  Sabbath  the  Evangelist 
clearly  shows  his  attitude.  There  is  no 
subject  on  which  his  Master's  teaching  had 
been  clearer  and  stronger.  Each  of  the 
Synoptic  writers  records  that  teaching.  In 
Mark  we  find  the  saying,  "  The  Sabbath  was 
made  for  man,  and  not  man  for  the  Sabbath  "  : 
one  of  the  most  pregnant  and  far-reaching  of 
all  the  sayings  of  Jesus.  In  Matthew  and  in 
Luke  we  have  the  principle,  "It  is  lawful  to 
do  well  on  the  Sabbath-day,"  enforced  by  the 
observation  that  no  Israelite  was  so  bigoted 
in  his  veneration  for  the  Sabbath  as  not  to 
attend  on  that  day  to  the  necessities  of  his 
domestic  animals.  There  can  be  no  doubt 
that  historically  this  was  the  view  taken  by 
the  Founder  of  Christianity.  In  Acts  and  in 
the  Pauline  writings  we  have  little  in  regard 
to  keeping  the  Sabbath.  We  observe  that 
the  Christian  habit  of  keeping  sacred  the  first 
day  of  the  week  instead  of  the  seventh  was 

1   Apology,  i.  46. 


JUDAISM    AND   THE   GOSPEL  227 

already  then  making  its  way  in  the  Church. 
St  Paul  on  the  Sabbath  goes  to  the  synagogue  ; 
but  it  is  scarcely  likely  that  he  kept  the  day 
at  all  strictly. 

In  the  time  of  the  Fourth  Evangelist,  the 
question  of  the  Sabbath  must  have  become 
for  Christians  far  less  acute.  And  in  a  place 
like  Ephesus,  where  the  Jews  were  in  a 
minority,  their  non-observance  of  the  day 
would  not  be  conspicuous.  It  is  therefore 
somewhat  remarkable  that  in  three  separate 
chapters,  v.,  vii.,  and  ix.,  he  should  dwell  on 
the  offence  given  to  the  Jewish  people  by 
Jesus'  healings  on  the  Sabbath-day.  This  is 
a  fact  for  which  it  is  not  easy  to  account,  if 
we  do  not  suppose  a  strong  substratum  of 
tradition  in  the  Gospel.  The  Apostle  on 
whom  the  Evangelist  relies  regarded  the 
breaches  of  the  Sabbath  by  Jesus  as  one  of 
the  chief  reasons  of  the  hatred  which  the 
strict  Jews  felt  for  Him ;  and  this  would  be 
very  natural,  considering  the  intense  feeling 
on  the  subject  which  dominated  Israel  at  the 
time.  But  the  Evangelist  mixes  with  the 
tales  of  offence  because  of  Sabbath-breaking 
other  elements  more  closely  related  to  his 
own  point  of  view.  In  v.  18  he  writes,  "For 
this  cause,  therefore,  the  Jews  sought  the 
more  to  kill  Him,  because  He  not  only  brake 


228  THE   EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

the  Sabbath,  but  also  called  God  His  P'ather, 
making  Himself  equal  with  God."  Jesus, 
according  to  the  Evangelist,  and  very  prob- 
ably according  to  the  historic  tradition,  had 
justified  His  activity  on  the  Sabbath  by  de- 
claring that  God  did  not,  as  the  Fathers  had 
feigned,  rest  on  the  seventh  day,  but  worked 
in  sun  and  rain,  in  nature  and  in  the  hearts  of 
men.1  To  such  a  saying  many  parallels  may  be 
found  in  the  Synoptics,  such  as  that  remark- 
able passage  in  3Iatthetv  in  which  Jesus  bids 
His  disciples  radiate  kindness  on  friend  and 
foe  alike,  as  the  Heavenly  Father  "  maketh 
His  sun  to  rise  on  the  evil  and  the  good,  and 
sendeth  rain  on  the  just  and  the  unjust."  The 
ending  words  of  the  passage  I  have  cited, 
"  making  Himself  equal  with  God,"  belong,  of 
course  (if  genuine)  entirely  to  the  Evangelist ; 
for  there  is  nothing  whatever  in  the  saying  of 
Jesus,  if  I  have  rightly  restored  it,  to  justify 
such  an  inference ;  and  it  is  impossible  to 
imagine  that  the  Jews,  seeing  before  them  a 
being  of  flesh  and  blood,  could  suppose  that 
he  made  himself  "  equal  to  God." 

In  another  passage  (ch.  ix.)  the  circumstance 
that  the  blind  man,  whose  healing  is  reported, 
was  made   whole   on   the   Sabbath   is  almost 

1  John  v.  1 7,  "  My  Father  worketh  even  until  now,  and 
I  work." 


JUDAISM    AND   THE    GOSPEL  229 

lost  sight  of  in  view  of  the  greater  question 
whether  such  deeds  of  healing  proved  the 
healer  to  be  sent  from  God,  whether  they  are 
one  of  the  "  signs  "  of  a  Divine  mission.  This 
latter  theme  is  one  to  which  the  Evangelist 
returns  often ;  and  we  may  suspect  that  the 
tale,  in  passing  through  his  mind,  has  some- 
what altered  its  centre  of  gravity.  In  its 
original  form  probably  greater  stress  may 
have  been  laid  upon  the  anger  of  the  Pharisees 
at  the  breach  of  the  Sabbath.  But  since  that 
controversy  was  no  longer  living,  the 
Evangelist  naturally  glides  on  to  a  subject 
which  was  more  stirring. 

In  dealing  also  with  the  Jewish  Scriptures 
our  Evangelist  goes  further  than  St  Paul. 
Paul  is  quite  clear  in  his  determination  that 
the  Jewish  law  was  not  incumbent  on  Gentile 
converts.  But  nevertheless  his  rabbinical 
training,  and  the  habit  of  bibliolatry  which 
came  from  it,  never  quite  lose  their  hold  on 
him.  "  The  law,"  he  says,  "  is  holy,  and  the 
commandment  holy  and  righteous  and  good." 
To  him  the  tales  of  the  Fall,  of  the  faith  of 
Abraham,  of  the  choosing  of  Jacob  and  the  re- 
jection of  Esau  as  told  in  Genesis,  are  not  only 
true,  but  they  are  great  events  in  the  deeper 
history  of  the  world.  Paul  takes  his  great 
doctrine   of   election    and    reprobation    direct 


230  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

from  the  Prophets.  The  Fourth  Evangelist 
never  had  the  rabbinic  training.  Time  and 
space  had  removed  him  far  from  the  worship 
of  Scripture,  which  had  so  close  a  relation  to 
the  religious  life  of  Jerusalem.  To  him  the 
whole  value  of  the  Scriptures  lies  in  the  one 
fact  that  they  contain  prophecies,  which  have 
been  fulfilled  in  the  life  of  Jesus  Christ.  Over 
and  over  again  he  cites  passages  of  Scripture 
as  foretelling  the  doings  and  the  sufferings  of 
his  Master.  In  the  nineteenth  chapter,  which 
records  the  events  of  the  crucifixion,  the 
phrase  "  that  the  Scripture  might  be  fulfilled  " 
recurs  as  a  refrain.  It  was  that  the  Scripture 
might  be  fulfilled  that  the  soldiers  parted  the 
garments  of  Jesus  by  lot ;  that  He  said  "  I 
thirst  "  ;  that  the  Roman  soldiers  did  not  break 
His  limbs,  but  pierced  His  side  with  a  spear. 

The  matter  is  summed  up  in  a  phrase  con- 
tributed by  the  Evangelist  himself,  "  Ye  search 
the  Scriptures,  because  in  them  ye  think  ye 
have  eternal  life ;  and  these  are  they  which 
bear  witness  of  Me."  But  apart  from  their 
prophecies  of  Christ,  the  Scriptures  scarcely 
come  into  the  Fourth  Gospel  at  all.  The 
old  battle  as  to  the  independence  of  Gentiles 
in  regard  to  the  law  had  been  fought  by  Paul 
and  won.  For  the  cosmology  of  Genesis  the 
Evangelist  substitutes  a  new  and  more  philo- 


JUDAISM   AND   THE   GOSPEL  231 

sophic  cosmology,  holding  that  the  world  was 
made  through  the  Logos  for  mankind.  He 
has,  in  fact,  abandoned  the  Old  Testament  for 
Plato  more  completely  than  did  Philo,  and  far 
more  completely  than  did  the  early  Church. 

I  have  observed  that  in  the  universalism  of 
his  religious  faith  the  Fourth  Evangelist  goes 
beyond  St  Paul.  This  will  clearly  appear  if 
we  compare  the  utterances  of  the  two  writers 
in  regard  to  Israel.  St  Paul  earnestly  be- 
lieved the  Jews  to  be  the  people  of  God, 
having  a  special  calling  and  relation  to  Him. 
Israel  by  no  means  ceases  to  exist  at  the 
coming  of  Christ,  but  is  extended  and  spiritual- 
ised. In  Romans  (ch.  ix)  he  argues  that 
although  the  adoption  by  God  and  the  pro- 
mises belong  to  Israel,  yet  they  appertain  not 
to  the  physical  descendants  of  Abraham,  but 
to  those  who  are  the  children  of  his  spirit,  the 
children  of  faith.  Thus  from  the  true  Israel 
many  of  Jewish  blood  are  shut  out ;  while 
many  Gentiles  become  in  Christ  the  children 
of  Abraham.  But  as  he  works  out  the  con- 
sequences of  this  doctrine,  his  tribal  conscience 
sometimes  revolts.  God,  he  says,  has  not  cast 
off  His  people.  The  Israelites  have  the  in- 
estimable privilege  of  being  the  custodians  of 
the  oracles  of  God.  St  Paul  hopes  that  in 
the  end  all  of  them  will  be  saved.     But  it  is 


232  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

clear  to  him  that  henceforth  they  must  share 
their  privileges  as  the  people  of  God  with  the 
Gentile  converts ;  and  that  if  they  reject  the 
faith  of  Christ  they  will  be  cut  off  and  wither. 
Always  the  distinction  between  Jew  and 
Gentile  is  present  to  his  mind.  And  it  seems 
from  Acts  that  it  was  only  the  repeated  ex- 
perience that  the  Gentiles  were  more  ripe  for 
faith  in  Christ  than  the  Jews  which  by  degrees 
drove  him  further  and  further  from  his  racial 
prejudices. 

The  Fourth  Evangelist,  living  at  a  time 
when  the  Christian  Church  was  more  clearly 
separated  from  Judaism,  and  in  a  city  which 
was  thoroughly  cosmopolitan,  had  not  the 
same  force  of  national  feeling  to  hold  him 
back ;  and  so  with  freer  and  bolder  steps  he 
advances  towards  the  universalism  which  was 
from  the  first  implicitly  present  in  his  Master's 
teaching.  He  can  scarcely  go  further  than 
the  moral  taught  in  the  story  of  the  Good 
Samaritan ;  but  he  can  develop  that  moral  in 
an  intellectual  direction.  The  theme  of  the 
whole  of  his  eighth  chapter  is  that  spiritual 
likeness,  which  is  the  same  thing  as  spiritual 
descent,  is  of  far  more  account  than  mere 
physical  race.  John  the  Baptist,  as  reported 
in  Matthew,  had  said,"  "  God  is  able  of  these 
stones  to  raise  up  children  unto  Abraham  "  ;  but 


JUDAISM    AND   THE   GOSPEL  233 

that  writer  does  not  report  of  Jesus  any  saying 
quite  so  strong.  But  the  Fourth  Evangelist 
represents  his  Master  as  declaring  that  the 
Jews  who  bitterly  oppose  Him  are  the  children 
rather  of  Satan  than  of  Abraham,  since  their 
deeds  show  their  spiritual  kinship. 

It  is  noteworthy  that  the  opposition  to 
Jesus,  the  persistent  misunderstanding  of  His 
teaching,  and  the  plots  against  His  life,  which 
are  in  the  Synoptists  ascribed  to  the  Pharisees, 
the  Lawyers,  and  the  Sadducees,  are  by  the 
Fourth  Evangelist  attributed  to  "  the  Jews." 
An  explanation  of  this  very  remarkable  fact 
has  to  be  sought.  It  is  clear  that  such  an  use 
cannot  come  from  the  Apostle  John,  nor  any 
of  the  Apostles.  It  can  only  come  from  a 
source  far  remote  from  Palestine.  For  during 
the  life  of  Jesus  the  whole  of  His  following 
consisted  of  Jews,  whether  of  Judaea  or 
Galilee,  and  the  people  as  a  whole  do  not 
seem  until  the  very  last  days  to  have  been 
hostile  to  Him.  According  to  both  Matthew 
and  Mark,  the  enemies  of  Jesus  did  not  dare 
to  arrest  Him  publicly,  for  fear  of  a  tumult  in 
His  favour.  And  if  the  Jews  had  been  con- 
sistently hostile,  could  Pilate  have  placed  on 
the  cross  the  title  "  This  is  the  King  of  the 
Jews  "  ? 

A  clue  may  perhaps  be  found  in  the  speech 


234  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

of  St  Paul  at  Miletus.  As  we  know  from 
Acts,  in  most  places  which  St  Paul  visited  it 
was  the  Jews  who  were  his  bitterest  perse- 
cutors and  opponents ;  and  they  succeeded  in 
inflicting  on  him  five  distinct  scourgings.  He 
declares  in  the  speech  at  Miletus  that  his  great 
difficulties  at  Ephesus  had  arisen  from  the 
hostile  plots  of  the  Jews.  It  would  therefore 
seem  that  at  Ephesus  the  Jews  were  especially 
hostile  to  Christianity.  How  strong  they 
were  even  within  the  Church  we  can  judge 
from  the  Apocalypse.1  But  the  Jews  outside 
the  Church  were  doubtless  still  more  bitterly 
opposed  to  anything  which  was  dangerous  to 
their  national  feeling,  and  incapable  of  under- 
standing the  lofty  spiritual  teaching  of  the 
Evangelist.  He  might  naturally  think  that 
the  Jews  of  Jerusalem,  in  the  fanatical  days 
which  preceded  the  destruction  of  the  city, 
would  be  still  more  bigoted  in  their  hostility. 

Although  the  hostility  of  the  Jews  to 
Christianity  was  specially  keen  at  Ephesus, 
we  know  that  it  was  everywhere  prevalent. 
Family  quarrels  are  notoriously  among  the 
most  bitter.  And  it  is  well  observed  by  Mr 
Scott2  that  many  of  the  objections  brought 
forward  by  the  Jews  to  the  teaching  and 
person  of  Jesus  are  just  those  which  we  find 

1  See  above,  p.  'A6.  2   The  Fourth  Gospel,  p.  73. 


JUDAISM   AND   THE   GOSPEL  235 

in  the  Talmud  and  in  the  work  of  Celsus,  who 
derived  his  arguments  from  Jewish  sources. 
There  is  therefore  a  dramatic  propriety  in  the 
Evangelist's  constant  reference  of  cavilling  to 
the  Jews.  But  it  is  dramatic  rather  than 
historic  propriety,  since  the  objections  which 
the  Jews  raise  are  usually  such  as  belong  to 
the  end  and  not  to  the  earlier  part  of  the 
first  century. 


XT 
THE  CHURCH  AND  THE  WORLD 

There  is  no  point  in  which  the  teaching  of 
the  Fourth  Evangelist  is  closer  to  that  of 
St  Paul  than  in  his  doctrine  of  the  Church. 
This  is  very  natural.  The  feeling  that  the 
Church  was  the  body  of  Christ,  and  that 
Christ  was  the  life  alike  of  the  Church  as  a 
whole,  and  of  the  individuals  who  composed 
it,  so  filled  the  horizon  of  what  we  may  call 
the  first  spiritual  school  of  Christianity,  that  it 
tended  to  shut  out  what  lay  beyond. 

In  the  view  of  the  Evangelist,  every  Christian 
became,  through  the  inward  grace  which 
accompanied  baptism,  a  part  of  the  Christ  on 
earth.  The  parable  in  which  he  most  clearly 
formulates  this  view  is  that  of  the  vine  and 
the  branches.  It  is  interesting  to  compare 
this  parable  with  the  closely  similar  and  yet  in 
some  ways  different  comparison  of  St  Paul, 
that  of  the  limbs  and  head  of  the  body.     Of 

236 


THE  CHURCH  AND  THE  WORLD  237 

course  it  does  not  do  to  take  a  metaphor  as 
if  it  were  a  scientific  statement,  nor  to  analyse 
a  poetic  figure  as  if  it  were  mere  prose,  yet, 
bearing  this  in  mind,  we  may  well  briefly  dwell 
on  the  two  figures.  Put  together,  they  make 
up  a  better  representation  of  the  inspiration  of 
the  Church  than  either  makes  separately. 

The  comparison  of  St  Paul  is  one  side  of 
the  truth.  It  sets  in  a  clear  light  the  superi- 
ority and  the  continued  rule  of  the  Founder. 
The  same  blood  flows  through  body  and  head  ; 
but  whereas  in  the  body  it  is  useful  only  for 
the  natural  processes  concerned  with  our  life 
on  earth,  breathing  and  digesting  and  the  rest, 
in  the  head  it  subserves  the  noblest  of  the 
purposes  for  which  man  exists,  thought,  feel- 
ing, and  imagination.  The  highest  duty  of  the 
limbs  is  to  move  as  the  head  directs  them, 
to  fulfil  the  purposes  in  life  which  the  head 
judges  worthy,  to  obey  and  to  serve.  And 
the  head  may  be  regarded  as  having  a  life  of 
its  own,  almost  independent  of  that  of  the 
body ;  at  least  it  is  the  earthly  seat  of  a  spirit 
which  dwells  in  it  but  is  not  essentially  con- 
fined to  it,  which  through  it  acts  upon  the 
world,  but  yet  sits  above  it;  which  may 
even,  as  psychologists  are  beginning  to  see 
clearly,  act  directly  upon  other  spirits  without 
being  restricted  by  merely  physical  conditions. 


238  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

It  is  perhaps  not  fanciful  to  think  that  in 
St  Paul's  mind,  when  he  made  the  comparison, 
the  infinitely  greater  spiritual  eminence  of  the 
Head  of  the  Church  than  that  of  the  members, 
and  their  duty  to  follow  in  all  things  the  will 
of  their  Lord,  was  on  the  surface.  But  there 
was  certainly  also  present  to  his  mind  the 
community  which  their  common  relation  to  the 
head  sets  up  in  the  limbs  and  parts  of  the 
body.  For  on  this  point  he  in  fact  dwells  at 
length,  speaking  of  the  functions  of  the  more 
and  the  less  comely  parts  of  the  body,  of  the 
eyes,  and  hands,  and  feet.  They  are  parts  of 
a  whole  and  related  one  to  the  other  mainly 
because  they  are  all  alike  servants  of  the  head. 
In  the  same  way  it  is  their  relation  to  their 
exalted  Lord  which  binds  Christians  into  a 
society. 

The  parable  of  the  Evangelist  in  which  he 
speaks  of  the  vine  and  the  branches  is  in  some 
ways  truer  and  more  telling.  I  may.  say  at 
once  that  I  deem  it  in  the  highest  degree  im- 
probable, if  not  impossible,  that  the  comparison 
could  have  come  from  Jesus  Himself.  Not 
only  is  the  character  of  the  comparison  quite 
different  from  the  character  of  the  parables 
given  in  the  Synoptists,  more  reflective  and 
far-fetched,  less  simple  and  direct,  but  also 
the  relation  of  the  Master  to  His  Church  which 


THE  CHURCH  AND  THE  WORLD  239 

it  illustrates  is  the  relation  which  subsisted  in 
the  Church  at  the  end  of  the  first  century,  not 
the  relation  which  held  while  Jesus  was  on 
earth.  As  applied  to  the  relations  of  a  wander- 
ing teacher,  at  the  head  of  a  band  of  devoted 
followers,  the  comparison  would  lack  point. 
But  it  is  suggestive  beyond  suggestiveness  if 
we  think  of  it  as  dawning  upon  an  inspired 
Evangelist  half  a  century  later. 

One  difference  between  this  comparison  and 
that  of  St  Paul  strikes  us  at  first  glance. 
Though  head  and  limbs  have  a  common  life, 
yet  the  head  is  not  the  limbs.  But  not  only 
do  the  vine  and  the  branches  have  a  common 
life,  but  the  branches  are  the  vine,  as  much  as 
is  the  stem  or  the  root.  Another  difference  is 
not  less  clear :  if  the  head  be  cut  off*  from  the 
limbs,  it  dies ;  if  the  branches  be  cut  away 
from  the  vine,  it  does  not  die,  but  throws  out 
fresh  shoots.  Indeed,  as  the  Evangelist  him- 
self points  out,  the  cutting  in  (not  cutting 
away)  of  the  branches  is  necessary  to  their 
full  productiveness.  We  must  not,  however, 
strain  the  differences  between  the  two  parables. 
Only  we  may  note  that  the  complete  identifica- 
tion of  the  vine  with  the  branches  is  valuable 
in  the  thought  of  the  Evangelist ;  and  it  brings 
out  in  relief  that  complete  identity  of  the 
Ruler   of  the    Church   and   the   members   of 


240  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

the    Church    on    which    he   does    not   tire   in 
insisting. 

There  are  two  other  comparisons  prominent 
in  the  Gospel  which  throw  light  upon  the 
Evangelist's  conception  of  the  Church.  One 
is  that  of  the  sheepfold.  The  fold  is  the  visible 
society,  and  the  sheep  are  the  Christians,  like 
sheep,  according  to  that  most  exquisite  Psalm 
which  begins  "  The  Lord  is  my  Shepherd,  I  shall 
not  want,"  but  also  separated  from  other  flocks 
and  having  a  close  relation  one  to  another. 
The  relation  of  Christ  to  the  sheepfold  is 
expressed  in  two  ways.1  He  is  first  spoken  of 
as  the  door  of  the  fold,  through  whom  alone 
any  man  can  enter  into  it.  It  is  only  by  being 
united  to  Christ  that  Christians  become  united 
to  one  another ;  through  spiritual  community 
with  their  Master  they  are  made  members  of 
His  flock.  Next,  Christ,  in  a  more  pleasing 
and  enduring  metaphor,  is  spoken  of  as  the 
Good  Shepherd.  Here  we  have  the  very 
language  of  the  Psalm  adopted  and  transfigured 
with  Christian  meaning.  None  of  the  Parables 
of  the  New  Testament  gained  greater  vogue 
among  the  early  Christians  than  this :  on  the 
walls  of  the  Catacombs  the  Good  Shepherd 
carrying  the  lamb  on  His  shoulders  is  one  of 
the  most  frequent  and  best  beloved  emblems. 
1  x.  7-11. 


THE  CHURCH  AND  THE  WORLD  241 

And  in  the  carving  of  the  marble  sarcophagi 
of  Rome,  which  are  a  little  later  than  the 
earliest  paintings  of  the  Catacombs,  the  same 
charming  figure  makes  its  constant  appearance. 
It  has  been  suggested  that  the  frequency 
of  the  figure  may  be  partly  accounted  for  by 
the  fact  that  it  was  a  mystery,  that  is  to  say, 
that  its  meaning  was  only  understood  by  the 
Society  ;  and  so  even  Pagan  sculptors  might  be 
set  to  produce  it  without  offence.  Shepherds 
in  rural  scenes  are  of  frequent  occurrence  on 
Pagan  sarcophagi  of  the  period.  There  may 
be  something  in  the  suggestion  ;  but  the  real 
reason  for  the  frequent  choice  of  the  emblem 
lies  deeper,  and  belongs  to  the  Christian  con- 
sciousness. It  is  frequent  because  it  was 
favourite  and  beloved.  Perhaps  some  may 
think  that  we  have  here  a  proof  that  the 
comparison  was  actually  used  by  Jesus  in 
His  teaching.  But  this  does  not  follow. 
Other  scenes  which  especially  belong  to  the 
Fourth  Gospel  are  notable  favourites  with 
the  painters  of  the  Catacombs,  especially  the 
healing  of  the  paralytic  man  at  the  pool  of 
Bethesda,  who  is  represented  as  carrying  his 
bed,1  and  the  scene  of  the  raising  of  Lazarus. 
It  is  clear  that  the  "  spiritual "  Gospel  had 
among   the   early    Christians   of   the   city   of 

1  v.  9. 

16 


242  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

Rome  a  vogue  even  greater  than  that  of  the 
other  Gospels.  In  those  days  the  people, 
whatever  may  have  been  the  case  with  the 
few  men  of  higher  education  who  came  into 
the  Church,  did  not  value  the  current  tales 
from  the  great  biography  in  proportion  to 
their  historic  authority,  but  in  proportion  to 
the  echo  which  they  called  forth  in  their  own 
spirits. 

The  other  figure,  which  is  more  familiar  to 
us  in  the  Synoptists,  is  that  of  a  kingdom. 
But  the  Evangelist  does  not  use  the  figure 
often,  perhaps  because  the  eschatological  views 
to  which  it  especially  belongs  are  absent  from 
his  Gospel.  And  when  he  does  use  it,  it  is 
in  a  peculiar  sense.  "My  kingdom  is  not  of 
this  world."  While  the  mass  of  Christians 
were  eagerly  expecting  the  return  of  their 
Master  in  the  clouds  of  heaven,  accompanied 
by  legions  of  angels,  to  set  up  in  the  world 
a  visible  realm  of  righteousness,  the  Evan- 
gelist recognises  his  Master,  not  as  an  earthly 
sovereign,  set  up  as  ruler  and  judge  by  a 
great  cataclysm,  but  as  king  of  an  inner  and , 
invisible  realm,  of  the  divine  kingdom  which 
is  within  us.  "Jesus  answered,  Thou  sayest 
that  1  am  a  king.  To  this  end  have  I  been 
born,  and  for  this  came  I  into  the  world,  that 
I  should  bear  witness  unto  the  truth.     Every- 


THE  CHURCH  AND  THE  WORLD  243 

one  that  is  of  the  truth  heareth  My  voice." 
The  King  as  a  witness  of  the  truth  at  first 
strikes  us  as  an  incongruity.  This  might  seem 
the  province  of  the  Prophet  and  the  Teacher 
rather  than  of  the  King.  But  the  Evangelist 
does  not  use  the  word  truth  in  the  ordinary 
sense.  Here  he  uses  it  obviously  not  in  the 
sense  of  truth  to  fact,  scarcely  even  in  the 
sense  of  ideal  or  spiritual  truth.  He  means 
rather,  those  who  are  faithful  and  listen  loyally 
to  the  voice  of  God  make  up  a  spiritual  realm 
of  which  Christ  is  Lord.  It  is  a  less  direct 
and  simple  way  of  putting  the  matter  than  is 
the  parable  of  the  shepherd  and  the  sheep ; 
but  at  bottom  there  is  the  same  meaning. 

That  the  writer  has  in  his  mind,  in  this  as 
in  other  parts  of  his  Gospel,  the  Christ  of  the 
Christian  experience  rather  than  the  Jesus 
of  history  is  clear  enough.  This  fact  comes 
out,  almost  naively,  in  many  passages,  especi- 
ally in  the  last  great  discourse.  "  Because  I 
was  with  you,  I  said  not  these  things  unto 
you."1  Of  course  this  implies  that  the  Master 
was  no  longer  with  His  disciples  in  the  free 
daily  intercourse  of  a  common  life.  "  These 
things "  are  the  wonderful  instructions  and 
consolations  which  have  gone  before,  and 
which  relate  altogether  to  the   conditions  of 

1  xvi.  4>. 


244  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

the  inspired  Church,  not  to  those  of  the 
witnesses  of  the  life.  It  is  quite  true  that 
in  the  context  we  have  an  explanation. 
"  These  things  have  I  spoken  unto  you,  that 
when  their  hour  is  come,  ye  may  remember 
them,  how  that  I  told  you."  No  doubt  many 
minds  will  prefer  to  take  this  explanation 
literally,  and  to  suppose  that  Jesus  gave  secret 
instructions  to  His  Apostles  to  be  stored  up 
for  future  use.  But  if  my  view  of  the  char- 
acter of  the  Gospel  be  right,  such  a  hypothesis 
is  excluded.  I  do  not  believe  that  it  can  be 
reconciled  with  modern  views  of  history.  It 
would  imply  that  Jesus  spoke  in  the  manner 
of  the  Evangelist,  and  not  in  the  manner 
recorded  in  the  Synoptists.  It  would  imply 
that  He  gave  His  instruction  not  in  short  and 
pregnant  sayings  and  parables,  but  in  long 
discourses.  It  would  imply  that  an  Apostle 
committed  these  discourses  to  writing  or  to 
memory,  and  reproduced  them  after  many 
years.  And,  above  all,  it  would  prove  that 
the  accounts  of  the  doings  of  the  Apostles 
after  the  Crucifixion  in  the  Synoptic  writings 
are  quite  without  foundation.  Were  or  were 
not  the  Apostles  surprised  and  disconcerted 
at  the  death  of  their  Master  ?  The  Synoptics 
affirm  that  they  were  ;  but  how  could  they 
have  been,  if  their  minds  had  been  carefully 


THE  CHURCH  AND  THE  WORLD  245 

prepared  for  this  very  eventuality  ?  History 
affirms  that  it  was  the  resurrection,  and  the 
conviction  of  the  Apostles  that  their  Master 
still  lived,  which  was  the  starting-point  of  the 
faith  :  if  He  had  told  them  that  He  was  going 
from  them  and  returning,  would  they  have 
shown  the  joyous  surprise  at  his  reappearance 
which  is  so  vividly  portrayed  in  the  Synoptic 
Gospels  ?  The  fact  is  that  the  discourse  given 
by  the  Evangelist  is  a  literary  convention, 
accepted  by  writers  of  the  time  as  quite 
allowable,  though  to  us  distasteful,  because 
we  live  in  a  different  intellectual  world,  and 
take  a  view  of  the  necessity  of  accuracy  in 
history  which  not  only  was  not  accepted  by 
the  Evangelist,  but  which  he  could  never  have 
been  brought  to  understand.  He  cared  for 
truth  as  much  as  we  do ;  but  his  conception  of 
what  constituted  truth  is,  as  I  have  shown  else- 
where in  this  book,  utterly  different  from  ours. 
Perhaps  the  mixture  of  tenses  in  the 
Evangelist's  mind  comes  out  still  more  clearly 
in  another  passage  : *  "  While  1  was  with  them, 
I  kept  them  in  Thy  name/'  Would  anyone, 
even  if  he  regarded  death  as  near,  speak  thus 
of  the  life  which  was  still  strong  within  him  ? 
Many  Christians  are  so  accustomed  to  regard 
their  Master,  not  as  "  perfect  man,"  but  as  a 

1  xvii.  12. 


246  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

supernatural  being  merely  condescending  to 
human  conditions,  that  they  regard  nothing 
that  He  might  say  or  do  as  to  be  judged  by 
the  canons  of  reason  and  probability.  But 
this  view  seems  to  me  not  a  higher,  but  a 
lower  one. 

It  is  consonant  with  the  root-idea  of  the 
Evangelist  that  the  life  of  Christians  on  earth 
is  a  continuation  of  the  life  of  Christ  on  earth, 
that  he  should  represent  the  Founder  as  pro- 
mising that  the  same  privileges  which  had 
belonged  to  Him,  as  Son  of  God,  should  be 
extended  also  to  them.  This  is  one  of  the 
main  features  of  the  Gospel,  and  it  is  one 
which  is  often  insufficiently  regarded.  Every 
reader  sees  how  in  the  Gospel  Jesus  is  exalted 
as  the  Son  of  God  and  the  manifestation  of  the 
Father.  But  not  every  reader  sees  that  what 
is  affirmed  of  the  Founder  is  in  most  matters 
affirmed  also  of  the  followers.  "  The  glory," 
Jesus  says,  "  which  Thou  hast  given  Me  I  have 
given  them."  And  there  is  another  still  more 
striking  passage :  "  He  that  believeth  on  Me, 
the  works  that  I  do  shall  he  do  also;  and, 
greater  works  than  these  shall  he  do,  because 
I  go  unto  the  Father."  The  Founder  has 
been  speaking  of  the  notable  works  which  He 
has  done  by  the  power  of  the  Father  ;  and  He 
adds  that  these  works  shall  still  be  done  in  the 


THE  CHURCH  AND  THE  WORLD  247 

Church,  which  is  as  inseparably  part  of  Him- 
self as  He  is  part  of  the  Father  ;  and  that  even 
greater  works  shall  mark  the  progress  of  the 
Society,  because  it  is  united  not  to  the  visible, 
but  to  the  exalted  Christ.  One  could  not,  of 
course,  hold  that  any  of  the  followers  of  Jesus 
has  ever  come  within  measurable  distance  of 
Him,  not  even  St  Paul  or  St  Francis,  but  yet 
the  community,  in  virtue  of  the  indwelling 
Spirit  of  Christ,  has  had  a  greater  and  wider 
effect  in  the  world  than  had  the  Founder. 

And  the  result  of  this  indwelling  Spirit  is, 
or  should  be,  Christian  unity  and  love  of  the 
brethren.  "  That  they  may  be  all  one  ;  even 
as  Thou,  Father,  art  in  Me  and  I  in  Thee,  that 
they  also  may  be  in  us."  *  A  glorious  ideal 
indeed,  which  has  never  in  the  course  of 
history  been  attained,  but  which  remains 
before  the  Church  as  a  beacon.  We  know 
very  well  from  Acts  and  the  Pauline  Epistles, 
that  though  at  moments  it  seemed  as  if  "  the 
multitude  of  them  that  believed  were  of  one 
heart  and  soul," 2  those  moments  were  few  and 
fleeting,  and  that  there  were  from  the  first 
jealousies,  strife,  envyings,  and  all  the  troubles 
which  spring  from  the  worldly  temper.  But 
nevertheless,  there  was  in  the  Church  a  closer 
unity  than  that  which  was  a  feature  of  all  the 

1  xvii.  21.  J  Acts  iv.  32. 


248  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

mystic  societies  which  abounded  on  the  shores 
of  the  Mediterranean,  and  which  angered  the 
conservative  Romans  as  being  anti-social.  As 
the  tone  of  the  Christian  community  was 
higher  than  that  of  the  Pagan  societies,  so 
was  the  mutual  love  of  the  members  greater, 
and  the  devotion  of  all  to  the  interests  of  the 
Society  and  to  the  service  of  its  Head  more 
complete ;  and  it  was  in  fact  this  devotion 
which  made  the  Christian  Church  become  in 
time  the  most  powerful  force  in  the  Roman 
Empire,  and  induced  the  time-serving  Emperor 
Constantine  to  throw  in  his  lot  with  it. 

The  Church  not  only  is  an  unity  in  itself, 
but  it  stands  in  strong  opposition  to  its 
medium,  the  World.  The  other-worldliness, 
which  has  from  the  first  been  at  once  the 
honour  and  the  reproach  of  Christianity,  is 
strongly  emphasised  in  the  Fourth  Gospel. 
In  the  presence  of  the  Roman  power  the 
Church  was  constantly  repeating  the  words 
addressed  to  Pilate,  "  My  kingdom  is  not  of 
this  world."  It  is  natural  that  the  Evangelist 
should  not  always  use  the  word  the  woi^ld  in 
the  same  sense.  In  some  places  he  uses  it 
in  the  simple  and  natural  way,  as  when  he 
speaks  of  the  light  which  lighteth  every  man 
who  cometh  into  the  world,  or  of  the  Saviour 
as  sent  to  save  the  world.     But  often,  as  was 


THE  CHURCH  AND  THE  WORLD  249 

natural  to  one  who  felt  that  he  belonged  to 
a  little  society  which  was  in  constant  hostility 
to  the  world  which  it  opposed  and  despised, 
the  Evangelist  thinks  of  the  world  as  an 
enemy,  as  the  enemy  with  which  the  Church 
has  ever  to  grapple.  The  disciples  are  called 
out  of  the  world  into  a  supermundane  organi- 
sation. "  If  ye  were  of  the  world,  the  world 
would  love  its  own ;  but  because  ye  are  not 
of  the  world,  but  I  chose  you  out  of  the 
world,  therefore  the  world  hateth  you."  But 
the  contest  between  the  Society  and  the 
hostile  environment,  although  it  visibly  goes 
on  all  around,  is  yet  really  in  the  spiritual 
world,  which  is  the  real  world,  already  deter- 
mined. "  In  the  world  ye  have  tribulation  ; 
but  be  of  good  cheer,  I  have  overcome  the 
world." 

It  is  hard  to  define  the  exact  thought  of 
the  Evangelist,  when  he  speaks  thus  of  "  the 
world."  Ancient  thinking  was  far  less  exact 
and  definite  than  modern.  And  a  mystic  like 
the  Evangelist  will  use  words  not  in  the  con- 
crete way  of  a  historian,  but  with  all  their 
atmosphere  of  meaning  which  appeals  to  the 
imagination  and  the  emotions  rather  than  to 
the  intelligence.  He  would  not  be  thinking 
primarily  of  the  Roman  Empire,  which  in 
Asia   Minor    interfered    but    little   with   the 


250  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

early  proceedings  of  the  Christians :  outside 
Judaea  anything  like  an  organised  persecution 
of  the  new  sect  did  not  exist.  As  it  is  clear 
from  Acts,  it  was  the  irreconcilable  hatred  of 
the  Jews,  stirring  up  popular  tumults,  which 
the  early  missioners  of  the  faith  had  to 
encounter.  The  Roman  officials  were  far  more 
likely  to  protect  than  to  harass  them.  But 
when  we  consider  the  Ephesian  background 
of  the  Gospel,  the  character  of  "  the  world  " 
will  be  clear.  A  busy  thriving  city,  in  the 
very  highways  of  trade,  and  in  the  main 
channel  through  which  Asiatic  influences 
spread  into  Europe,  and  European  into  Asia, 
comes  up  to  our  imagination.  There  were 
the  quays  and  the  markets  of  commerce ; 
there  were  the  resorts  of  pleasure  and  dissi- 
pation ;  there  were  the  halls  and  porticoes 
where  the  philosophers  discoursed  all  day ; 
there  were  the  frequent  processions  and  shows 
of  the  votaries  of  I  sis  and  Cybele,  with  their 
trains  of  shaven  priests  and  self-mutilators ; 
above  all,  there  was  the  organised  worship 
of  the  great  goddess  Artemis,  "  whom  all  Asia 
and  the  world  worshippeth,"  by  whose  cult 
Ephesus  had  grown  rich,  and  whose  image 
was  copied  in  scores  of  cities  of  Asia  Minor. 
It  was  a  world  not  at  all  like  the  severe 
crowds  of  Jerusalem :    more  like  the  Vanity 


THE  CHURCH  AND  THE  WORLD   251 

Fair  of  the  imagination  of  Bunyan,  wholly 
given  to  pleasure  and  to  gain. 

Such  a  world  must  always  be  in  opposition 
to  the  seriousness  of  religious  reformers,  who 
regard  the  amusements  of  the  frivolous,  and 
the  search  after  wealth  and  visible  honours, 
as  unworthy  of  the  attention  of  men  whose 
hearts  are  set  on  the  things  which  are  invisible, 
who  make  the  doing  of  the  Divine  Will  the 
one  worthy  purpose  of  life.  But  while  most 
reformers  struggle  against,  it  like  men  who 
try  to  swim  across  a  swift  stream,  the  early 
Christians  regarded  it  as  a  thing  already  over- 
come by  the  cross  of  Christ.  The  world  had 
been  conquered  by  the  devotion  of  the  Son 
of  God ;  what  remained  to  His  followers  was 
only  to  keep  what  He  had  won,  and  not  to 
allow  the  conquered  foe  to  rise  from  the 
ground. 

As  to  those  who  came  into  and  composed 
the  Church,  the  Evangelist  is  quite  explicit. 
They  were  the  children  of  the  light,  not  of 
darkness ;  they  were  those  who  had  nothing 
in  common  with  the  worlds  and  so  were  hated 
by  the  world.  Their  coming  into  the  Church 
was  a  result  of  Divine  grace  and  favour ;  but 
they  could  not  have  come  if  they  had  not 
loved  truth  and  sought  the  light.  They  were 
scattered  through  the  world  like  the  grains  of 


252  THE   EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

gold  in  quartz  rock ;  and  when  Jesus  Christ 
was  lifted  up,  they  were  drawn  to  the  Society 
which  inherited  the  Spirit  of  Christ.  They 
were  God's,  and  God  gave  them  to  Christ,  and 
with  them  all  who  should  believe  through 
them. 

Mr  Scott,  with  other  good  authorities,  has 
tried  to  show  that  the  Evangelist  contem- 
plated with  favour  the  organisation  of  the 
Church  under  leaders,  that  he  regarded  a  fixed 
constitution  of  it  as  good  and  necessary.1  In 
my  opinion  he  scarcely  proves  his  point.  I 
should  allow  that,  considering  the  view  which 
the  Evangelist  took  of  the  Sacraments  and  of 
miracles,  he  would  not  be  disposed  to  under- 
value the  need  of  a  visible  church  with  a  fixed 
organisation,  and  it  is  easy  to  understand  that 
later  times  might  find  in  such  sayings  as  "  As 
Thou  didst  send  Me  into  the  world,  even  so 
sent  I  them  into  the  world,"  a  justification  of 
such  teaching  as  that  of  the  Apostolic  succes- 
sion. But  this  seems  to  be  stretching  the 
meaning  of  phrases  which  have  really  a  simpler 
and  more  natural  interpretation.  Early  as  the 
notion  of  ruling  bishops  made  its  entrance  into 
the  Churches  of  Asia,  it  can  scarcely  have  been 
accepted  when  the  Gospel  was  written. 

As  the  Evangelist  deals  so  largely  in  allusion 

1    The  Fourth  Gospel,  p.  111. 


THE  CHURCH  AND  THE  WORLD  253 

and  in  symbol,  it  is  not  difficult  to  find  in  his 
words  reference  to  any  of  the  early  Christian 
views.  But  it  is  much  safer  to  take  a  broader 
and  more  literal  view  of  them.  When  the 
Evangelist  wishes  to  avoid  an  unpractically 
spiritual  view  at  any  point,  he  does  not  hesitate 
to  say  so  clearly.  He  regards  the  greatest 
value  of  miracles  as  symbolical,  yet  he  does 
not  throw  doubt  on  their  actual  occurrence. 
He  thinks  that  it  is  degrading  to  attach  an 
excessive  or  magical  significance  to  the  Sacra- 
ments, yet  he  declares  them  essential  to  the 
Church.  But  he  does  not  clearly  suggest  that 
Church  discipline  and  the  Episcopal  order  are 
essential. 

Let  us  turn  again  to  the  figures  under  which 
he  presents  the  relation  of  the  Church  to  her 
Head.  He  might  easily  have  modified  the 
figure  of  the  vine  and  the  branches  by  teaching 
that  while  Christ  was  the  stem  of  the  vine,  the 
Apostles  and  their  delegates  were  the  branches 
connecting  the  stem  with  the  leaves  and  twigs 
which  might  stand  for  ordinary  believers.  But 
he  does  not  say  this  :  he  puts  all  Christians 
into  a  similar  relation  towards  the  inner  life  of 
the  Church.  No  doubt  the  figure  of  the  vine 
and  the  branches  occurs  in  the  last  great  dis- 
course ;  and  some  critics  might  hold  it  to  be 
addressed  only  to  the  Apostles ;  but  such  an 


254  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

interpretation  would  be  at  variance  with  the 
whole  character  of  the  Gospel.  Similarly,  in 
the  parable  of  the  sheepfold,  the  Evangelist 
might  have  spoken  of  under-shepherds  or  of 
sheep-dogs,  but  he  does  not  do  so :  there  is 
only  one  shepherd,  and  only  one  door  to  the 
sheepfold ;  and  the  sheep  stand  on  one  level. 
So  again,  when  the  Kingdom  of  Christ  is 
mentioned,  the  Kingdom  has  but  one  ruler. 
He  speaks  of  one  Lord  and  Master,  and  of  all 
others  as  brethren.  Even  in  the  Epistle  we 
have  no  mention  of  Apostolic  authority,  or  of 
subordination  of  one  Christian  to  another,  such 
as  we  find  in  the  pseudo- Pauline  Epistles  to 
Timothy  and  Titus. 

We  need  not  take  these  facts  as  proving 
that  the  Evangelist  was  a  convinced  democrat 
in  matters  of  Church  government.  Such 
matters  do  not  seem  to  have  occupied  his 
mind.  I  should  be  quite  ready  to  allow  that 
there  are  passages  in  the  Gospel  which  could 
be  used,  and  were  at  a  later  time  used,  in  the 
interests  of  ecclesiastical  discipline  and  sub- 
ordination. By  a  prophetic  instinct  working 
beneath  the  surface  of  consciousness,  the 
Evangelist  may  have  been  dimly  aware  of 
the  dangers  which  threatened  the  Church  from 
such  movements  as  that  of  the  Montanists  at 
the  end  of  the  second  century.     He  may  have 


THE  CHURCH  AND  THE  WORLD  255 

obscurely  felt  that  by  doctrine,  by  sacrament, 
and  by  organisation,  the  Church  must  before 
long  assert  herself  in  the  face  of  a  hostile 
world.  But  we  are  bound  to  go  by  the  facts. 
And  in  fact  we  cannot  find  that  the  Evan- 
gelist asserts  the  necessity  of  Church  discipline 
as  he  asserts  the  necessity  of  doctrine  and  of 
sacrament. 

Had  St  Paul  been  alive  when  the  Gospel 
was  written,  he,  with  his  genius  for  organisa- 
tion, would  probably  have  seen  the  necessity 
for,  so  to  speak,  hardening  the  shell  of  the 
Church.  It  was  in  the  Pauline  Churches  that 
Episcopacy  originated.  But  the  Fourth  Evan- 
gelist was  a  saint  and  a  mystic,  and  not 
concerned  at  heart  as  to  the  outward  organisa- 
tion of  the  Christian  Society. 


XII 
TEACHING   AND   ETHICS 

In  the  present  chapter,  as  much  as  in  any 
other,  we  shall  be  called  on  to  combat  current 
conventional  views,  while  we  try  to  set  forth 
the  character  of  the  words  and  the  teaching 
of  the  Saviour  as  understood  by  the  Evan- 
gelist, and  the  relations  of  this  teaching  to 
Christian  faith. 

We  are  familiar  with  a  literal  and  un- 
imaginative interpretation  of  wo?~d  and  wo?*h\ 
which  is  widely  current.  It  is  supposed  that 
Jesus  set  forth  truths  (not  truth)  as  to  the 
being  of  God,  as  to  His  own  relation  to  the 
Father,  as  to  the  nature  of  spiritual  things  ; 
and  that  in  order  to  show  that  He  had  the 
right  to  proclaim  these  truths,  He  did  certain 
mighty  works,  gave  supernatural  signs  that 
He  was  authorised  thus  to  expound  the  nature 
of  the  supersensible.  As  in  all  views  of  the 
Divine  which   are   honestly   held,  there   is   a 

256 


TEACHING   AND   ETHICS  257 

certain  kernel  of  truth  in  this  way  of  taking 
the  Gospel.  But  it  is  only  the  lower  and 
more  materialist  side  of  the  truth,  the  same 
kind  of  truth  which  some  Jews  grasped  when 
they  realised  that  Jesus  was  the  Messiah 
whom  they  had  expected,  and  whom  they 
wanted  to  make  a  king,  or  which  the  crowd 
at  Jerusalem  accepted  when  it  welcomed  Him 
as  the  Son  of  David.  But  it  is  not  a  view 
which  really  appreciates  the  teaching  of  the 
Evangelist. 

It  is  necessary  briefly  to  distinguish  the 
senses  in  which  the  word  truth  is  used. 
These  are  three,  which  we  may  term  (1)  the 
scientific,  (2)  the  metaphysical,  (3)  the  ethical 
or  spiritual. 

The  first  of  these  is  in  our  days  the  most 
usual.  We  regard  a  statement  as  true  if  it 
conforms  to  the  facts  of  experience,  whether 
material  or  psychological.  A  true  witness  is 
a  witness  who  states  appearances  exactly  as 
they  were.  A  true  theory  is  one  which  con- 
forms to  experience,  and  explains  the  facts. 
A  true  picture  is  one  which  gives  the  outer 
world  as  it  is  presented  to  our  sight.  This 
use  of  the  word  is  so  usual  with  us  that  we 
do  not  realise  its  essential  modernity.  It 
was  Greece  which  first  trained  the  world  to 
it,  Greece,  the  country  in  which  science  was 

17 


258  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

born.  And  modern  progress  in  science  and 
devotion  to  science  has  accustomed  us  to  it 
more  and  more,  until  it  has  become  almost 
an  effort  to  us  to  think  of  truth  in  another 
light. 

The  second  sense,  the  metaphysical,  contrasts 
the  obvious  views  of  things,  the  presenta- 
tions of  sense,  with  the  truth  or  reality 
which  lies  behind  them.  It  regards  the 
visible  and  audible  world  as  full  of  illusion, 
and  the  world  of  reality  as  lying  beyond  and 
above  it  in  the  supersensible  world,  or  in  the 
Divine  thought.  Such  a  view  is  perhaps  most 
fully  developed  by  the  sages  of  the  East,  of 
India  and  Persia.  But  it  was  introduced 
into  the  West  and  naturalised  there,  first  by 
the  philosophers  of  Ionia,  who  sought  the  real 
and  permanent  among  passing  phenomena. 
Anaxagoras  of  Clazomenae  taught  that  it  was 
only  intelligence  or  the  idea  which  brought 
order  into  the  chaos  of  phenomena.  Hera- 
cleitus  of  Ephesus  said  that  wisdom  is  one 
A#2,f  thing:  it  is  to  know  the  thought  by  which 
all  things  are  steered.  But  it  was  Plato  who 
superseded  all  earlier  and  dominated  all  later 
philosophers  by  his  theory  of  ideas,  by  his  view 
that  all  material  things  were  but  imperfect 
copies  of  the  types  laid  up  in  heaven.  After 
Plato  the  search  for  what  is  real,  for  the  one 


TEACHING   AND   ETHICS  259 

among  the  many,  and  for  being  through 
illusion,  was  carried  on  by  all  the  philosophic 
schools.  In  our  days  metaphysics  has  fallen 
into  disrepute.  Philosophers  continue  their 
discussions  at  the  universities  ;  but  the  public 
knows  little  of  them,  and  does  not  greatly 
concern  itself  with  their  disputes.  But  we 
must  remember  that  at  the  beginning  of  the 
Christian  era  philosophy  held  the  place  in  the 
mental  atmosphere  which  is  now  taken  by 
science ;  and  that  every  man  of  education 
concerned  himself  with  those  metaphysical 
problems  which  we  are  apt  to  regard  as  in- 
different, or  at  all  events  insoluble. 

These  renderings  of  truth,  aletheia,  come 
down  to  us  from  Hellas.  They  are  intellectual 
renderings.  But  in  mankind,  and  especially 
among  primitive  peoples,  other  concep- 
tions of  truth  are  prevalent.  The  intellectual 
faculties  after  all  are  by  no  means  the  whole 
of  man.  The  Hebrew  word  'emeth,  rendered 
by  aletheia  in  the  Septuagint,  and  by  truth 
in  our  version  of  the  Old  Testament,  has  a  more 
ethical  meaning. 

In  Asia  generally,  and  notably  among  the 
Jews,  when  truth  is  spoken  of  or  a  true  person 
commended,  it  is  seldom  that  the  word  bears 
the  restricted  scientific  sense.  Truth  in  man 
is  sincerity  and  transparency  of  soul,  loyalty 


260  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

in  word  and  action.  Its  essence  is  set  forth 
in  the  speech  of  the  chivalrous  Achilles  of 
Homer  : x  "  He  is  to  me  as  hateful  as  the  gates 
of  death,  who  utters  one  thing  with  his  lips 
and  hides  another  in  his  heart."  And  since 
man  can  only  speak  and  think  of  God  in  ways 
borrowed  from  his  experience  of  his  fellow- 
men,  the  truth  of  God  also  is  at  bottom  a 
kind  of  loyalty  to  man,  a  uniformity,  a 
steadfastness  in  mercy  and  in  justice,  which 
is  revealed  in  a  measure  to  experience,  but 
can  only  be  fully  apprehended  and  realised 
by  an  exercise  of  faith. 

Those  who  are  familiar  with  the  Psalms, 
that  noble  gift  of  Israel  to  mankind,  must  be 
well  aware  of  the  way  in  which  the  word  truth 
is  used  in  our  English  versions  of  them.  I 
need  but  recall  a  few  familiar  phrases.  "  Lead 
me  in  Thy  truth  and  teach  me."  "  The  paths 
of  the  Lord  are  mercy  and  truth."  "  O  send 
out  Thy  light  and  Thy  truth  ;  let  them  lead 
me."  "  Thou  desirest  truth  in  the  inward 
parts."  "  Hear  me  in  the  truth  of  thy  salva- 
tion." "  Mercy  and  truth  are  met  together." 
"The  truth  of  the  Lord  endureth  for  ever." 
Similar  phrases  are  to  be  found  in  Proverbs, 
and  in  Isaiah  and  the  other  prophets :  I  need 
not  add  to  my  citations.     It  must  occur  to 

1  Iliad,  ix.  312. 


TEACHING   AND   ETHICS  261 

every  thoughtful  reader  that  the  sense  or 
senses  attaching  to  the  word  truth  in  the 
Psalms  is  quite  different  from  that  usual  in 
modern  life.  We  use  the  word  predominantly 
to  signify  correspondence  between  statements 
and  actual  experience.  This  is  a  natural 
result  of  our  immersion  in  the  facts  of  science 
and  observation  and  the  material  world.  We 
also  speak  of  a  true  friend  or  a  true  heart, 
signifying  steadiness  and  loyalty.  But  the 
other  meaning  is  altogether,  predominant. 

If  we  turn  to  the  Fourth  Gospel,  we  find 
indeed  traces  of  both  the  scientific  and  the 
metaphysical  uses  of  the  word  truth  ;  but  the 
word  is  predominantly  used  in  the  ethical  and 
spiritual  sense.  We  will  begin  with  a  few 
examples  in  which  the  Evangelist  dwells  on 
what  may  be  called  facts,  though  mainly  facts 
not  of  material  but  of  spiritual  experience. 

In  the  colloquy  with  Nicodemus,  the 
Evangelist  expressly  declares  that  a  part  of 
the  truth  which  Jesus  taught  was  not  new,  but 
such  as  an  Israelite  should  easily  recognise. 
Jesus  sets  forth  one  of  the  grandest  laws 
of  the  spiritual  world,  the  unforeseen  and 
spontaneous  action  of  the  Divine  Spirit  in  the 
world.  "  The  wind  bloweth  where  it  listeth, 
and  thou  nearest  the  voice  thereof,  but  knowest 
not  whence  it  cometh  and  whither  it  goeth  : 


THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

so  is  everyone  that  is  born  of  the  Spirit." 
(The  last  sentence  might  be  more  intelligibly 
rendered  if  we  wrote  "  such  is  the  action  of 
the  Spirit  on  all  those  who  are  born  of  it "). 
Immediately  Jesus  goes  on  to  say  with  sur- 
prise, "  Art  thou  a  teacher  of  Israel,  and 
understandest  not  these  things  ?  "  And  indeed 
"  these  things  "  are  taught  in  a  fashion  which  is 
inimitable  in  the  Hebrew  Psalms.  "  Whither 
shall  I  go  from  Thy  Spirit,  or  whither  shall  I 
flee  from  Thy  presence  ?  "  "  Cast  me  not  away 
from  Thy  presence,  and  take  not  Thy  Holy 
Spirit  from  me."  Such  utterances  are  frequent 
in  the  Psalms.  And  the  eternal  type  of  the 
man  obsessed  by  the  Divine  Spirit  which  he 
cannot  escape  is  Amos  the  herdsman  of  Tekoa, 
to  whom  the  voice  of  God  came  while  he 
followed  his  calling,  and  burned  like  a  fire 
within  him,  until  he  gave  utterance  to  the 
inward  passion. 

The  Gospel  teaching  in  such  matters  as 
these  is  continuous  with  that  committed  to 
Israel ;  not  a  new  doctrine,  but  an  old  doctrine 
made  fresh  by  the  life  of  Him  who  uttered  it. 
It  was  a  part,  no  doubt,  of  the  Truth  which 
Jesus  had  to  proclaim  to  the  world.  It  is,  in 
a  lofty  region,  strictly  scientific  truth,  or  truth 
of  observation  and  experience. 

The  modern  mind,  however,  is  very  apt  to 


TEACHING    AND   ETHICS  263 

regard  as  assertions  of  scientific  truth,  or 
matter  of  fact,  what  was  not  really  in  ancient 
literature  meant  as  such.  For  example,  in  the 
prophecies  of  the  Bible  we  are  apt  to  find 
exact  descriptions  of  events  in  the  future,  when 
what  the  prophet  really  discerned  and  meant 
to  set  forth  were  underlying  tendencies  which 
were  working  their  way  towards  the  world  of 
sight,  but  might  never  reach  it.  We  may 
illustrate  this  from  a  passage  in  the  Fourth 
Gospel. 

In  xvi.  13  it  is  written,  "  He  (the  Spirit) 
will  show  you  things  to  come."  And  no 
doubt  the  inspired  m  utterances  in  the  early 
Church  did  sometimes  speak  of  the  future. 
But  the  Greek  word  used  is  in  the  present, 
erchomena,  things  that  are  on  the  way  towards 
us.  And  it  is  the  character  of  the  noblest 
prophecy  not  to  specify  the  exact  time  or 
manner  of  events  in  the  future,  but  to  dwell 
on  tendencies,  what  is  striving  out  into  exist- 
ence. Through  all  history  the  prophets  who 
have  tried  to  detail  future  history  have  failed  ; 
but  the  great  ones  among  them,  who  have 
seen  into  the  heart  of  things  and  declared 
in  what  direction  they  were  moving,  have 
succeeded.  The  truth  of  prophecy  is  not  truth 
to  fact  but  truth  to  idea.  Again,  it  is  written 
(xiv.  26),  "  He  shall  bring  to  your  remembrance 


264  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

all  that  I  said  unto  you."  This  is  just  the 
sort  of  saying  which  the  modern  mind,  when 
untrained,  misinterprets.  The  whole  character 
of  the  Gospel  shows  clearly  that  when  the 
author  thus  writes  he  does  not  mean  that  the 
Spirit  shall  recall  to  the  memory  of  the 
disciples  the  exact  words  of  their  Lord  :  that 
is  not  the  result  of  inspiration,  but  rather  the 
function  of  an  exact  and  retentive  memory. 
What  he  clearly  means  is  that  the  Spirit  shall 
reveal  the  higher  meaning  of  the  utterances 
of  the  Master,  in  their  relation  to  the  life  of 
the  Church.  The  function  of  the  Spirit  is  to 
guide  to  the  higher  truth,  to  take  the  impulses 
of  the  indwelling  Christ  and  reveal  them  to 
the  disciples. 

Surely  no  view  of  the  mission  of  Jesus  could 
be  more  false  than  that  which  would  regard 
Him,  who  was  the  way,  the  truth,  and  the  life, 
as  a  mere  proclaimer  of  truths  in  the  usual 
current  sense  of  the  word.  The  kind  of  truth 
which  our  great  researchers  are  ever  striving 
after,  and  which  is  embodied  in  our  manuals 
of  science  and  of  history,  is  of  a  kind  to  which 
the  Founder  and  His  Apostles  alike  were 
indifferent.  It  is  concerned  with  the  world 
visible  and  tangible  and  audible.  Our  senses 
and  our  intelligence  were  given  us  that  we 
might  acquire  for  ourselves  this  kind  of  truth  ; 


TEACHING   AND   ETHICS  265 

and  if  it  were  revealed  to  us  by  any  kind  of 
inner  inspiration,  it  would  be  almost  worthless 
to  us."  It  is  the  search  for  it  which  is  the  great 
discipline  of  the  intellectual  life  ;  and  whether 
we  find  or  fail  to  find  it,  we  grow  by  the  search. 
But  the  field  of  this  truth  is  not  the  world  of 
spirit.  Those  who  think  that  because  Jesus 
was  the  Son  of  God  He  could  not  be  wrong 
in  attributing  a  particular  Psalm  to  David  or 
a  particular  saying  to  Moses  show  a  crassness 
of  imagination  which  is  exactly  like  that  of 
the  Woman  of  Samaria,  when  she  said,  "  Sir, 
Thou  hast  nothing  to  draw  with,  and  the  well 
is  deep :  from  whence  then  hast  Thou  that 
living  water  ? "  or  like  that  of  Nicodemus 
when  he  objected,  "  How  can  a  man  be  born 
when  he  is  old  ?  can  he  enter  a  second  time 
into  his  mother's  womb,  and  be  born  ?  "  It  was 
indignation  at  such  want  of  spiritual  compre- 
hension which  stirred  up  the  Evangelist  to 
write  his  "  spiritual  gospel " ;  and  those  who 
are  the  children  of  the  truth  in  the  higher 
sense  of  the  word  will  always  repudiate  such 
materialist  -limitation  of  outlook. 

But  for  a  higher  rendering  of  the  moral  and 
religious  doctrine  of  Israel,  we  naturally  go 
rather  to  the  first  three  Gospels  than  to  the 
Fourth.  The  summary  which  is  commonly 
called   the    Sermon   on   the    Mount    has    far 


266  THE    EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

greater  contents  in  this  line  than  have  the 
writings  of  our  Evangelist.  There  is  another 
kind  of  teaching  which  seems  to  him  at  once 
more  novel  and  more  spiritual,  and  which  he 
is  apt  to  call  "  My  words  "  or  "  the  truth." 

There  is  a  lofty  Platonic  sense  which  may 
in  some  cases  influence  the  expression  of  the 
Evangelist.  To  Plato  the  world  of  ideas,  the 
invisible  and  eternal  world  in  which  were  laid 
up  the  patterns  of  earthly  things,  is  the  real 
or  true  world,  and  the  reflections  of  that 
world  in  the  visible  universe  are  little  more 
than  illusion.  Even  St  Paul,  though  he 
reaches  this  idealist  position  by  a  road  of 
his  own,  yet  seems  sometimes  to  reach  it, 
as  when  he  writes,  "  Let  God  be  found  true 
and  every  man  a  liar,"1  or  again,  "  The  things 
which  are  seen  are  temporal ;  but  the  things 
which  are  not  seen  are  eternal."2  But  the 
detached  philosophic  thought  of  Plato  is  in 
complete  contrast  to  St  Paul's  practical  ways 
of  regarding  things.  And  the  Fourth  Evan- 
gelist is  nearer  in  this  matter  to  St  Paul 
than  to  Plato.  After  all,  the  garb  of  a 
Platonic  philosopher  will  not  fit  him.  In  his 
Preface  he  uses  the  term  Logos,  borrowed 
from  the  schools  of  philosophy ;  but  he  does 
not  write  his  Gospel  in  that  key. 

1    Romans  iii.  4.  2  2  Cor.  iv.  1 8. 


TEACHING    AND   ETHICS  267 

The  truth,  as  taught  by  the  Evangelist, 
does  not  consist  of  mere  truths.  It  does 
not  include  the  facts  of  the  visible  world, 
which  are  matter  of  observation.  Nor  does 
it  consist  in  an  intellectual  illumination,  which 
sees  the  permanent  in  the  temporary  and  the 
reality  lying  behind  the  mere  phenomenon. 
Of  course  it  is  not  wholly  independent  of 
intellect,  but  it  is  not  primarily  intellectual. 
It  is  not,  indeed,  any  connected  or  reasoned 
system  of  belief.  It  is  what  St  Paul  some- 
times calls  a  mystery,  not  that  it  is  an  abstruse 
matter  demanding  thought  and  investigation, 
but  that  it  embodies  the  secret  principle  of 
life  of  a  sacred  society,"  and  must  not  be  lightly 
spoken  of  to  unbelievers.  If  we  begin  by 
quoting  a  few  passages  from  the  Evangelist, 
this  will  become  clearer. 

The  higher  kind  of  truth  found  by  the 
Evangelist  in  the  teaching  of  his  Lord  is 
often  called  by  him  words  or  sayings,  logoi 
and  remata.  "  The  words  which  1  speak  unto 
you,  they  are  spirit  and  they  are  life."1  "If 
ye  abide  in  me,  and  my  words  abide  in  you, 
ask  whatsoever  ye  will,  and  it  shall  be  done 
unto  you."  To  the  same  effect  is  the  speech 
of  St  Peter :  "  Lord,  to  whom  shall  we  go  ? 
Thou   hast  the  words  of  eternal   life."     The 

1  John  vi.  63. 


268  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

connection  of  the  words  with  life  is  insisted 
on  in  another  passage :  "  If  a  man  keep  My 
saying,  he  shall  never  see  death."1  In  some 
passages  the  Evangelist  seems  even  to  equate 
two  things  which  to  a  superficial  view  seem 
most  opposed,  words  and  works  :  "  The  words 
that  I  say  unto  you  I  speak  not  from  Myself: 
but  the  Father  abiding  in  Me  doeth  the 
works."2  In  other  passages,  instead  of  words 
or  sayings,  we  find  the  expression  truth  :  "  Ye 
shall  know  the  truth,  and  the  truth  shall  make 
you  free." 3  "  To  this  end  have  I  been  born, 
and  to  this  end  am  I  come  into  the  world,  that 
I  should  bear  witness  unto  the  truth."4  In 
the  same  way  the  Paraclete  or  Comforter  is 
called  "  the  Spirit  of  truth " ;  and  of  the 
Saviour  Himself  it  is  said,  "  I  am  the  way, 
the  truth,  and  the  life." 

It  is  clear  that  in  such  passages  as  these 
the  reference  is  not  to  any  verbal  teaching, 
however  lofty,  but  to  the  faith  which  unites 
the  disciples  to  the  Master,  and  makes  of  the 
two  one  mystical  body,  in  which  impulses 
come  to  the  members  from  the  Head,  and 
the  members  reflect  on  earth  the  Divine  life. 
"  This  is  life  eternal,  that  they  should  know 
Thee,  the    only  true    God,  and    Him   whom 

1  John  viii.  51.  -  John  xiv.  10;  compare  xv.  22-24. 

3  viii.  32.  4  xviii.  37. 


TEACHING    AND    ETHICS  269 

thou  didst  send,  even  Jesus  Christ."  To 
know  in  this  passage  is  clearly  not  to  be 
aware  of,  or  to  be  convinced  of,  the  existence 
of  God  and  Christ,  but  to  have  communion 
with  them  through  the  Spirit.  It  is  con- 
trasted with  mere  intellectual  gnosis,  such 
as  the  Gnostics  relied  on.  It  is,  in  fact, 
the  "  truth "  of  the  Psalms,  but  adapted  to 
new  conditions,  and  become  almost  a  technical 
word  in  the  new  religion. 

Nevertheless,  those  are  in  the  right  who 
regard  the  Evangelist  as  the  first  originator  of 
a  creed.  As  he  sees  the  need  of  sacraments, 
so  he  is  aware  that  some  basis  of  common 
belief  and  common  expression  of  belief 
is  necessary  to  every  religious  body  which 
will  maintain  itself  apart  from  the  world. 
When  St  Paul  has  to  state  the  common 
beliefs  to  Christians,  he  falls  back  on  the 
main  facts  of  the  life  and  death  of  his  Master, 
as  he  received  them  from  tradition,  more 
especially  on  the  Resurrection  from  the  grave. 
The  Fourth  Evangelist,  true  to  his  general 
principle  of  detaching  belief  from  fact  of 
sense  and  attaching  it  to  Christian  experience, 
takes  a  somewhat  different  line. 

There  is  this  about  the  Evangelist,  which 
indeed  adapts  his  work  far  better  to  the 
building  up  of  the  Church,  that  he  does  not 


270  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

confine  himself  to  the  setting  forth  of  the 
highest  truth  in  an  abstract  form,  but  realises 
that  for  ordinary  humanity  it  must  embody 
itself  in  forms,  whether  speculative  or  practical. 
He  cannot  think  of  a  loyal  spiritual  union 
with  the  Society  unless  it  be  united  with  a 
minimum  of  consent  to  doctrine.  Before  a 
convert  can  be  received  into  the  Society,  he 
must  accept  the  rudiments  of  a  creed.  He 
must  believe  that  Jesus  is  the  Christ,  that  He 
is  the  Son  of  God,  that  He  came  in  the  flesh, 
and  not  merely,  as  the  Gnostics  held,  as  a 
sort  of  spiritual  apparition.  This  outline  of 
a  creed  seems  to  the  Evangelist  indispensable, 
and  in  the  Epistle  he  dwells  on  it ;  but  even 
there  it  is  the  practical  results  of  the  creed, 
rather  than  its  mere  expression,  of  which  be 
thinks.  "  Who  is  he  that  overcometh  the 
world,  but  he  that  believeth  that  Jesus  is  the 
Son  of  God  ? "  And  more  strongly  still, 
"  This  is  the  antichrist,  even  he  that  denieth 
the  Father  and  the  Son."  This  is  probably 
the  earliest  form  of  the  Christian  creed.  From 
the  first  the  creed  was  a  baptismal  confession, 
and  when  the  Ethiopian  was  baptised  by 
Philip,  the  instructor  was  content  with  the 
simple  confession,  "  I  believe  that  Jesus 
Christ  is  the   Son  of  God."1     Sometimes  it 

1  Acts  viii.  37.     This  verse  is  omitted  in  the  R.V. 


TEACHING   AND    ETHICS  271 

is  such  words  as  these  that  the  Evangelist 
means  when  he  speaks  of  remata,  rather  than 
of  any  moral  and  spiritual  teaching.  Such 
words  are  the  natural  and  almost  inseparable 
accompaniment  of  membership  of  the  Society 
and  faith  in  its  spiritual  Head.  And  the 
truth  of  these  words  is  their  consonance  with 
the  experienced  relation  of  the  exalted  Christ 
to  the  Church.  If  this  pragmatist  view  of 
doctrine  had  always  been  preserved  in  the 
Church,  if  the  mere  logical  intellect  had  been 
warned  off  the  sacred  ground  of  belief,  many 
of  the  evils  from  which  the  Church  at  a  later 
time  suffered  would  have  been  avoided. 

There  are  certain  aspects  in  which  religious 
and  spiritual  truth  presents  itself  to  the 
Evangelist,  of  which  I  must  briefly  speak. 
In  the  first  place,  the  acceptance  of  truth 
seems  to  him  an  escape  from  bondage  into 
a  glorious  liberty.  "  The  truth  shall  make 
you  free " :  that  is,  union  with  Christ  shall 
set  you  free  from  the  bondage  of  sin  and 
death.  St  Paul  also  is  very  fond  of  speaking 
of  the  freedom  which  comes  from  faith  in 
Christ,  "the  glorious  liberty  of  the  children 
of  God."  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  while 
to  many  modern  Christians  the  faith  of  Christ 
seems  a  kind  of  discipline  and  self-restraint, 
it  was  another  aspect  of  it,  the  escape  from 


272  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

a  smaller  to  a  larger  and  more  glorious  life, 
which  most  impressed  the  first  disciples. 

To  St  Paul  the  escape  was  primarily  from 
slavery  to  the  Jewish  Law,  with  its  exacting 
materialism.  But  in  the  time  of  the  Evan- 
gelist Jewish  Law  had  been  left  behind  in 
the  progress  of  the  Church.  To  him  the 
freedom  was  from  sin,  and  Satan,  the  source' 
of  sin.  "  He  that  committeth  sin  is  the  slave 
of  sin."  And  the  Son  of  God  was  made 
manifest  on  earth  that  He  might  destroy  the 
power  of  sin,  and  set  its  captives  free. 

Another  of  the  aspects  in  which  truth 
appears  to  the  Evangelist  is  as  a  touchstone 
to  discern  those  who  have  in  them  the  seeds 
of  eternal  life.  "  He  that  rejecteth  Me,  and 
receiveth  not  My  sayings,  hath  one  that 
judgeth  him :  the  Word  that  I  spake,  the 
same  shall  judge  him  in  the  last  day."  Of 
course  the  Evangelist  does  not  put  this 
forward  as  rounded  doctrine.  He  more  often 
speaks  of  judgment  as  committed  to  the  Son. 
But  we  see  his  meaning.  The  mere  utterance 
of  the  higher  truth  tests  men :  if  they  accept 
it  and  carry  it  into  their  lives,  they  become 
heirs  of  eternal  life ;  if  they  reject  it,  they 
are  by  the  mere  rejection  condemned. 

The  Gospel  of  the  Evangelist  is  not  only 
a  gospel  of  freedom,  but  also  a  gospel  of  love. 


TEACHING   AND   ETHICS  273 

"  If  ye  love  Me,  keep  My  commandments," 
comes  in  the  Gospel.  In  the  Epistle  we  have 
the  same  idea  worked  out  with  an  iteration 
which  never  tires.  Love  is  the  bond  which 
connects  all  the  factors  in  the  spiritual  world, 
as  (to  use  a  modern  comparison)  gravitation 
is  the  bond  which  connects  together  things 
material.  The  founder  of  Christianity,  in  a 
well-known  passage  in  all  the  Synoptists,  bases 
love  to  man  on  love  to  God,  and  puts  the 
latter  in  the  first  place.  But  to  the  Fourth 
Evangelist  the  love  of  the  brethren  for  one 
another,  which  is  part  and  parcel  of  their  love 
for  Christ,  is  so  insistent  that  he  is  inclined 
to  give  it  first  place.  "  If  a  man,"  he  writes, 
"  say,  I  love  God,  and  hateth  his  brother,  he 
is  a  liar :  for  he  that  loveth  not  his  brother 
whom  he  hath  seen,  cannot  love  God  whom 
he  hath  not  seen."1  This  is  part  of  the 
wonderful  lovingness  of  the  Evangelist ;  and 
it  reflects  the  spirit  of  the  Church ;  for  it  was 
the  mutual  love  of  Christians  which  overcame 
the  world. 

Another  teaching  of  the  Evangelist,  which 
is  common  to  him  and  the  Synoptists,  and 
indeed  all  New  Testament  writers,  which 
runs,  indeed,  like  a  golden  thread  through  all 
early   Christian   teaching,    is   devotion  to  the 

1  Epistle  iv.  20. 

18 


274  THE    EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

Divine  Will.  "  I  came  not  to  do  mine  own 
will,  but  the  will  of  Him  that  sent  Me"  is  an 
expression  of  the  spirit  of  the  Master's  life 
which  is  seen  not  only  in  the  acts  of  the 
historic  Jesus,  but  in  the  lives  of  all  His 
true  followers,  from  that  day  to  this.  It  is 
love  for  the  Divine  Will  which  connects  the 
successive  generations  of  Christians,  and  forms 
them,  as  has  been  well  said,  into  a  "  logos 
society."  Here,  at  least,  there  is  no  dis- 
crepancy between  the  earlier  and  the  later 
views  of  the  Founder.  The  most  marked 
and  essential  feature  of  the  human  life  of 
Jesus  Christ  continues  to  be  the  most  marked 
and  essential  feature  of  the  Church.  Devo- 
tion to  the  Divine  Will  is  the  blood  which 
circulates  alike  through  head  and  limbs,  the 
sap  which  flows  through  the  stem  and  branches 
of  the  vine.  To  do  that  will  was  to  the 
Master  meat  and  drink  ;  and  the  same  Divine 
sustenance  has  never  failed  His  Church. 

When  we  have  spoken  of  the  love  of  God, 
which  leads  men  gladly  to  devote  their  lives 
to  His  service,  and  love  for  the  brethren, 
which  binds  the  whole  society  into  an  unity, 
we  have  practically  finished  with  the  ethics 
of  the  Fourth  Evangelist.  In  this  respect 
he  presents  a  strong  contrast  to  St  Paul, 
whose  Epistles  are  full  of  maxims  of  conduct, 


TEACHING    AND   PTTHICS  275 

who  tells  his  converts  how  they  are  to  bear 
themselves  towards  the  surrounding  heathen 
and  the  political  authorities,  what  are  the 
mutual  duties  of  husbands  and  wives,  parents 
and  children,  and  the  like.  As  the  Evangelist 
gives  us  a  spiritual  version  of  his  Master's 
life,  so  he  transforms  morality  by  a  spiritual 
principle.  St  Paul  says  that  love  is  the  ful- 
filling of  the  law,  and  the  key  to  all  Christian 
virtue.  But  to  the  Evangelist  love  seems  to 
take  the  place  of  every  sense  of  duty.  Hence 
we  cannot  expect  from  him  that  deep  sense 
of  sin  which  is  so  conspicuous  in  the  Pauline 
writings,  and  which  was,  no  doubt,  produced 
in  the  mind  of  the  Apostle  by  the  facts  of 
his  own  life,  and  his  spiritual  wrestlings. 
"  Perfect  love,"  the  Evangelist  says,  "  casts  out 
fear  " —  among  other  fears,  the  fear  of  punish- 
ment for  sin.  But,  in  his  view,  sin  was  im- 
possible to  the  true  disciple :  "  Whosoever 
abideth  in  Him  sinneth  not."  "  Whosoever  is 
begotten  of  God  doeth  no  sin :  he  cannot 
sin."  All  sin  belongs  to  the  world  :  "  the  lust 
of  the  flesh,  and  the  lust  of  the  eyes,  and  the 
vainglory  of  life."  And  as  the  Society  stands 
in  radical  opposition  to  the  world,  these  things 
have  no  hold  on  it.  Yet  in  another  passage 
he  allows  that  in  practice  even  Christians  fall 
into  sin :  "If  we  say  that  we  have  no  sin,  we 


276  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

deceive  ourselves."  But  the  blood  of  Christ, 
union  with  the  Divine  Head,  cleanses  from 
sin,  and  imparts  the  principle  of  eternal  life. 
In  the  fervour  of  the  early  Church  the  notion 
that  men  could  fall  into  sin  through  ignorance 
and  want  of  self-control  naturally  occupied  a 
small  place  in  the  hearts  of  believers.  But 
in  fact,  as  in  the  doctrine  of  the  Evangelist 
as  to  salvation  by  faith,  we  must  presuppose 
a  Pauline  stratum,  so  we  must  suppose  that 
the  Church  of  Ephesus  maintained  the 
Pauline  ethics. 


XIII 
MIRACLE 

Next  to  the  relation  of  Christian  faith  to  the 
words,  we  have  to  speak  of  its  relation  to  the 
works,  of  the  Founder.  We  have  the  same 
story  to  tell  again.  A.s  the  Evangelist  soars 
above  the  literal  value  of  the  words  of  his 
Master,  so  he  regards  His  mighty  works  as 
valuable  indeed  to  impress  the  people  in  their 
natural  form,  but  far  more  valuable  in  the 
higher  meaning  which  shines  through  them. 
Those  who  have  to  do  with  the  Moslem 
population  of  such  countries  as  Syria  and 
North  Africa  tell  us  that  there  no  teacher 
attains  to  influence  and  credit  unless  he  be- 
comes renowned  as  a  worker  of  marvels. 
M.  Doutte,  who  had  a  long  experience  in 
Algeria,1  tells  us  that  he  made  the  acquaint- 
ance of  many  local  saints,  but  of  none  who 
had  not  this  faculty.     The  working  of  marvels 

1   Revue  de  I' hist,  des  religions,  xl.  p.  355. 
277 


278  THE   EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

was  the  seal  of  their  vocation,  without  which 
it  would  not  have  been  accepted  as  authentic. 
The  Fourth  Evangelist  takes  this  view  as 
natural  and  universal.  He  thinks  that  those 
who  cannot  rise  to  the  height  of  pure  spiritual 
teaching  may  well  be  drawn  to  the  faith  by 
the  evidence  of  miracles.  This  view  indeed 
he  expresses  clearly  enough :  "  Though  ye 
believe  not  Me,  believe  the  works."  In 
another  place  he  writes  :  "  Many  believed  on 
His  name,  beholding  the  signs  which  He  did. 
But  Jesus  did  not  trust  Himself  unto  them, 
for  that  He  knew  all  men,"  and  so  knew  that 
men  who  were  thus  impressed  by  mere  visible 
wonders  would  not  be  a  high  type  of  disciple. 
Jesus  expresses  impatience  at  the  demand  for 
miracle,  saying  sadly,  "  Except  ye  see  signs 
and  wonders,  ye  will  not  believe."  Quite  in  the 
same  line  is  the  saying  to  Thomas,  "  Because 
thou  hast  seen  Me,  thou  hast  believed  :  blessed 
are  they  that  have  not  seen,  and  yet  have 
believed." 

But  though  persuasion  through  visible  signs 
and  wonders  may  be  the  mark  of  a  low  level 
of  spiritual  development,  yet  the  signs  and 
wonders  themselves  may  be  the  expression 
and  the  vehicle  of  "  the  word."  The  mere 
wonders  may  be  signs ;  they  may  be  of  such 
a   character   as   to  show  unity  of  nature  be- 


MIRACLE  279 

tween  the  Christ  and  the  Heavenly  Father : 
"My  Father  worketh  even  until  now ;  and  I 
work."  This  was  said  when  Jesus  was  re- 
proached for  healing  on  the  Sabbath-day. 
The  phrase  is  too  brief  to  be  clear ;  but  it 
seems  to  mean  that  as  God  does  not  suspend 
His  beneficent  action  in  the  world  on  the 
Sabbath,  so  His  Son  on  earth  should  not  cease 
on  that  day  to  do  to  men  such  good  as  falls 
naturally  in  His  way.  The  unity  of  will  of 
the  Father  and  the  Son  is  shown  in  action  as 
well  as  in  thought.  Another  passage  is  even 
more  remarkable :  "  The  Father,  abiding  in 
Me,  doeth  His  works."  The  Evangelist  felt 
that  the  works  of  the  Church  were  the  result 
of  her  union  with  the  exalted  Christ,  and  his 
mind  goes  on  to  the  view  that  the  actions  of 
Jesus  in  the  world  were  the  result  of  His 
union  with  uhe  Father.  He  works  back  from 
the  experience  of  the  Church,  as  he  so  often 
does,  to  the  history  of  the  Founder. 

We  have  traces  of  the  same  line  of  thought 
in  Matthew ;  but  there  it  seems  more  ap- 
propriate to  the  actual  teaching  of  Jesus : 
"  That  ye  may  be  the  children  of  your  Father 
which  is  in  heaven,  for  He  maketh  His  sun 
to  rise  on  the  evil  and  the  good,  and  sendeth 
rain  on  the  just  and  the  unjust."1     Here  the 

1  Matt.  v.  45. 


280  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

direct  relation  of  men  to  God  is  spoken  of 
rather  than  the  relation  of  the  Church  to 
Christ :  the  spirit  is  broader  and  more  uni- 
versalist ;  but  the  Fourth  Evangelist  was  in 
his  way  not  less  in  the  line  of  the  highest 
religious  thought  than  the  First. 

The  Fourth  Evangelist  looks  at  miracles 
notably  in  a  different  way  from  the  Synoptists. 
As  critics  have  observed,  the  place  which  they 
take  in  relation  to  faith  is  inverted.  In  the 
Synoptists  faith  is,  in  some  cases  at  least,  a 
necessary  condition  in  the  person  who  is  healed 
before  the  healing  can  take  place.  To  the 
Fourth  Evangelist  faith  is  not  represented  as 
the  condition  of  miracle,  but  as  its  result. 
The  miracle  is  wrought  that  men  may  believe. 
Again,  whereas  the  miracles  of  healing  in  the 
Synoptists  are  miracles  of  mercy  and  com- 
passion, wrought  because  Jesus  had  sympathy 
with  the  sufferers,  the  miracles  recorded  by 
the  Fourth  Evangelist  tend  to  the  glory  of 
Him  who  wrought  them.  They  are  proofs, 
not  of  His  humanity,  but  of  His  divinity. 

And  further,  particular  wonders  hide  beneath 
their  surface  some  thesis  of  the  higher  Chris- 
tian teaching.  Indeed,  the  description  of  a 
miracle  is  often  followed  by  an  exposition  of 
its  higher  or  spiritual  meaning.  We  may  give 
a   few   examples.     The   feeding   of    the    five 


MIRACLE  281 

thousand  with  loaves  and  fishes  is  used  as  a 
parable  not  once  only  but  twice  over,  in  a 
lower  and  in  a  higher  sense.  First,  Jesus  says 
to  the  multitude  which  followed  Him  across 
the  sea,  "  Ye  seek  Me,  not  because  ye  saw 
signs,  but  because  ye  ate  of  the  loaves,  and 
were  filled.  Labour  not  for  the  meat  which 
perisheth,  but  for  the  meat  which  abideth 
unto  eternal  life."  Those  who  came  after  Jesus 
merely  for  what  they  could  get  were  at  a 
lower  level  even  than  those  who  were  taken 
with  visible  signs.  But  the  miracle  was  more 
than  a  mere  sign  or  proof  of  a  Divine  mission. 
The  multiplication  of  loaves  and  fishes  was 
a  sign  of  the  wonderful  satisfying  virtue  of 
the  bread  which  came  down  from  heaven  for 
the  feeding  of  the  Church.  It  was  early 
believed  that  the  Evangelist  here  refers  either 
primarily  or  secondarily  to  the  Christian  sacra- 
ment ;  and  we  treat  of  the  passage  more  fully 
in  that  connection. 

When  Jesus  heals  the  blind,  the  inner 
meaning  is  that  He  came  into  the  world  to 
remove  the  blindness  of  sin  and  of  ignorance, 
"  that  they  which  see  not  may  see,  and  that 
they  which  see  may  become  blind."1  The 
Synoptic  writers  see  in  these  sudden  cures 
the  result  of  mere  kindness  and  love  for 
1  ix.  39. 


282  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

mankind  ;  but  to  the  Fourth  Evangelist  that 
seems  a  superficial  view,  which  by  no  means 
exhausts  the  significance  of  the  event.  In 
the  same  way,  the  raising  of  Lazarus  is  no 
mere  action  of  kindness  and  friendship :  its 
main  importance  is  that  it  introduces  the 
Christian  sentence,  "  I  am  the  Resurrec- 
tion and  the  Life."  And  when  we  think  of 
the  vast,  the  inestimable  service  to  the  Church 
which  the  phrase  has  rendered,  we  shall  keenly 
feel  that  the  allegorising  of  our  Evangelist  was 
the  result  of  a  profound  Christian  inspiration. 

In  the  case  of  another  noteworthy  miracle, 
the  turning  of  the  water  into  wine,  we  are  on 
less  safe  ground,  since  the  Evangelist  does  not 
in  this  case  himself  give  the  interpretation. 
Modern  commentators  find  a  natural  contrast 
between  the  mere  water  of  the  Jewish  dis- 
pensation and  the  wine  of  the  Gospel.  And 
this  interpretation  may  serve,  since  at  the 
time  there  was  no  ascetic  aversion  to  wine, 
but  it  was  regarded  as  one  of  the  kindest  of 
God's  gifts  to  men.  But  as  it  stands  the 
miracle  is  closely  like  those  mere  marvels 
which  abound  in  the  Apocryphal  Gospels, 
and  the  tales  in  regard  to  which  sprang  out 
of  the  mere  desire  to  magnify  the  supernatural 
powers  of  the  Founder. 

It    is   well    known    that    other    classes    of 


MIRACLE  283 

miracles,  especially  exorcisms  of  evil  spirits, 
are  not  recited  in  this  Gospel.  It  is  a  very 
remarkable  instance  of  omission,  which  must 
be  purposeful.  Possibly  the  explanation  may 
be  a  simple  one,  that  the  Evangelist  intended 
only  to  bring  in  a  small  number  of  miracles, 
in  fact  seven,  to  illustrate  spiritual  truths, 
and  the  tales  of  exorcism  did  not  seem  suited 
to  his  purpose. 

The  story  of  the  raising  of  Lazarus  has 
been  the  subject  of  infinite  discussion.  Some 
critics  have  given  a  very  elaborate  account 
of  the  method  of  its  composition,  and  the 
reasons  for  the  insertion  of  every  detail.  It 
can  scarcely  be  doubted  that  the  emphasis  laid 
by  the  Evangelist  on  the  fact  that  Lazarus 
had  been  dead  for  some  days  shows  that  he 
meant  to  insist  on  the  supernatural  power  of 
Jesus.  But  it  is  easy  to  be  led  away  by  fancy 
when  we  try  to  discover  hidden  and  symbolical 
meanings  in  the  details  of  a  story.  Other 
critics  are  disposed  to  think  that  there  was 
some  actual  historic  foundation  for  the  narra- 
tive ;  and  I  am  ready  to  agree  with  them. 
It  has  been  said  that  so  remarkable  a  miracle 
could  not,  if  it  had  really  taken  place,  have 
been  omitted  by  the  Synoptists.  But  the 
Synoptic  narrative  really  only  touches  a  few 
detached  points  of  the  life  of  Jesus ;  and  it 


284  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

may  be  that  the  Fourth  Evangelist  has 
worked  up  the  tale  from  his  own  point  of 
view,  and  made  it  loom  very  large  in  the 
prospect.  To  us,  as  to  him,  the  main  value 
of  the  episode  is  in  the  spiritual  meaning 
which  it  conveys. 

It  is,  of  course,  quite  impossible  to  recover 
the  exact  facts  which,  supposing  the  event  to 
have  a  historic  basis,  constituted  that  basis. 
The  view  of  Renan,  that  something  like  a 
pious  fraud  was  arranged  between  Jesus  and 
His  friends  at  Bethany,  is  of  course  most 
repulsive  to  all  Christians.  And  it  is  quite 
gratuitous,  for  the  Evangelist  deals  so  freely 
with  his  sources  of  information  that  we  cannot 
press  this  or  that  detail  of  the  narrative  into 
evidence  of  collusion.  We  must  be  content  to 
say  that  the  story  is  probably  a  transposition 
into  a  higher  key  of  something  which  really 
happened,  but  which  probably  did  not  take 
the  great  place  in  the  imagination  of  the 
people  of  Jerusalem  which  the  Evangelist 
supposes. 

It  remains  to  speak  of  the  two  great 
miracles  of  the  Gospels,  which  were  not  signs 
of  something  beyond  them,  but  which  were 
regarded  as  primary  events  in  the  history  of 
Jesus  Christ :  His  birth  and  His  resurrection. 
Of  course,  when  the   Evangelist   wrote,   the 


MIRACLE  285 

tale  of  the  Virgin  Birth  was  current  in  the 
Church.  It  would  have  been  hard  a  priori  to 
tell  what  line  he  would  take  in  regard  to  it. 
On  the  one  hand,  it  might  well  seem  that  the 
appearance  of  the  Word  in  flesh  might  be 
the  occasion  of  a  special  miracle.  There  is 
certainly  no  actual  contradiction  between  the 
tale  as  told  in  the  First  and  Third  Gospels 
and  the  first  verses  of  the  Fourth.  But  if  we 
look  beyond  mere  words  and  statements  to 
ideas,  we  may  see  that  the  Virgin  Birth  on  the 
one  hand,  and  the  coming  of  the  Word  on  the 
other,  might  well  be  regarded  as  alternatives. 
In  Matthew  and  Luke  there  is  no  notion  of 
pre-existence :  the  Jesus  whose  life  they  tell 
begins  to  exist  at  the  Annunciation.  And,  as 
M.  Reville  points  out,  there  is  an  incongruity 
between  the  idea  of  a  divine  son  born  by  a 
special  interposition  of  God  at  a  particular 
place  and  time,  and  the  idea  of  an  ever-existing 
Word,  revealed  to  sense  and  in  time.  It 
would  be  simpler  and  more  natural  that  the 
Word  should  be  united  to  humanity  at  the 
Baptism  by  John  rather  than  before  birth. 
Holding  a  very  definite  view  that  what  was 
born  of  the  flesh  was  flesh,  and  what  was  born 
of  the  Spirit  was  spirit,  the  Evangelist  would 
have  no  occasion  to  seek  for  a  miraculous 
origin  of  the  body  of  Jesus. 


286  THE    EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

And  I  think  that  a  careful  reader  oi'  the 
narrative  of  the  meeting  of  John  and  Jesus 
will  see  that  such  notions  were  in  the  mind 
of  the  writer.  It  is  true  that,  by  one  of  those 
curious  omissions  which  surprise  the  student 
of  the  Gospel,  he  does  not  actually  mention  the 
fact  of  baptism.  This  may  well  be  because 
it  was  beneath  the  dignity  of  Jesus  to  be 
baptised  by  anyone.  But  he  lays  extreme 
stress  on  the  testimony  of  John,  that  he 
disclaimed  for  himself  the  Messiahship,  but 
declared  that  he  had  seen  the  Spirit  descending 
as  a  dove  out  of  heaven,  and  abiding  on  Jesus. 
One  reason  for  thus  dwelling  on  the  self- 
subordination  of  the  Baptist  to  his  successor 
probably  was  that  there  still  existed,  in  the 
time  of  St  Paul,  a  sect  at  Ephesus  who 
acknowledged  the  baptism  of  John  and  looked 
up  to  him  as  its  founder  ;  and  it  was  important 
to  meet  the  views  of  this  sect.  But  however 
that  be,  it  is  simple  and  natural  to  suppose 
that  for  the  Evangelist  this  descent  of  the 
Spirit  and  its  abiding  on  Jesus  was  the  occasion 
on  which  the  Divine  Logos  was  united  to  the 
human  Jesus,  and  thereafter  took  the  place  of 
His  natural  soul.  This  view  would  of  course 
be  similar  to  that  of  the  Docetists,  who  regarded 
the  human  life  of  the  Founder  as  a  sort  of 
mirage,  and   thought  that  the   Divine   Spirit 


MIRACLE  287 

which  had  come  to  Him  at  baptism  deserted 
Him  again  on  the  cross.  It  cannot,  in  fact,  be 
denied  that  if  the  narrative  of  the  Evangelist 
be  regarded  as  a  biography,  recording  actual 
doings  and  teaching,  it  is  closely  akin  to 
Docetism.  It  is  only  by  looking  at  it  in  the 
light  of  the  idea,  not  of  the  fact,  that  it  gains 
its  true  position. 

These,  however,  are  speculations.  What  is 
quite  clear  and  certain  for  all  serious  students 
is  that  the  Evangelist  does  not  value  the  tale 
of  the  Virgin  Birth,  that  he  bases  on  it  no 
teaching,  and  never  appeals  to  it  as  evidence 
of  the  supernatural  character  of  the  Founder. 
No  doubt  his  mere  passing  over  of  the  tale 
would  not  in  itself  be  conclusive,  for  the 
Evangelist  assumes  as  known  many  things 
which  were  part  of  the  recognised  biography. 
But  it  does  have  some  significance  when,  in 
more  than  one  place,1  he  speaks  of  Jesus  as  the 
son  of  Joseph.  For  it  is  his  habit,  when  he 
finds  any  account  or  statement  in  the  earlier 
biographies  which  seems  to  him  unworthy  of 
the  Son  of  God,  to  alter  it  to  make  it  more 
appropriate.  If  he  had  objected  to  the  state- 
ment of  the  paternity  of  Joseph,  it  is  almost 
certain  that  he  would  have  found  a  way  of 
avoiding  such  statement. 

1   i.  45  ;  vi.  42. 


288  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

The  other  great  miracle,  that  of  the  Resur- 
rection, with  the  appearances  to  the  disciples, 
is  prominent  in  the  Gospel.  The  story  is  told 
so  simply,  and  so  circumstantially,  that  it  is 
hard  to  accept  any  view  in  regard  to  its  origin 
except  that  it  came  to  the  Evangelist  on  the 
authority  of  one  of  the  Apostles.  And  the 
graphic  touches  in  regard  to  the  disciple  whom 
Jesus  loved  are  noteworthy.  When  he  heard 
from  Mary  Magdalene  in  the  early  morning  of 
the  third  day  that  the  stone  which  closed  the 
tomb  had  been  rolled  away,  he  at  once  set  out 
for  the  spot,  he  and  Peter  running  together ; 
and  being  no  doubt  the  younger  man,  he  ran 
the  faster,  and,  coming  first  to  the  tomb,  looked 
in,  and  saw  the  linen  cloths  lying.  When 
Peter  came  up,  and  went  into  the  tomb,  he 
followed,  and  saw  "  the  napkin  which  was 
upon  His  head  not  lying  with  the  linen  cloths, 
but  rolled  up  in  a  place  by  itself."  "  And  he 
saw  and  believed."  It  is  no  doubt  very 
difficult  ever  to  judge  from  the  naturalness  and 
vividness  of  a  story  that  it  is  really  historic. 
But  it  is  very  hard  for  any  reader  not  to  think 
that  we  have  here  a  simple  piece  of  testimony, 
an  uncoloured  narrative  of  fact.  The  authority 
would  naturally  be  St  John :  this  is  perhaps 
the  passage  in  the  Gospel  where  his  personality 
most   clearly  shows   through.     When,  in  the 


MIRACLE  289 

same  passage,  we  read  that  Mary  Magdalene 
mistook  the  risen  Christ  for  the  gardener,  we 
have  another  point  in  which  the  eye-witness  is 
clear.  I  feel  sure  that  the  Evangelist  is  re- 
porting testimony  which  had  come  to  him  by 
direct  authority  ;  only  the  phrase  "  the  disciple 
whom  Jesus  loved "  speaks  of  the  admiring 
pupil  who  put  the  tale  upon  paper,  not  of  the 
Apostle. 

The  further  narrative  of  the  appearances  of 
Jesus  to  the  disciples  is  less  vivid  ;  but  that 
also  must  be  based  on  the  statements  of  an 
eye-witness.  The  main  fact  to  which  it 
testifies,  that  the  Apostles  believed  that  they 
saw  their  risen  Lord,  is  beyond  dispute 
historic.  But  how  far  this  vision  must  be 
regarded  as  miraculous  is  a  difficult  question. 
To  answer  it,  a  man  should  have  a  very  com- 
plete knowledge  of  the  results  of  the  psychical 
studies  of  recent  years.1  The  only  properly 
miraculous  element  in  it  is  the  physical :  that 
it  was  the  actual  body  which  had  hung  on  the 
cross  which  appeared  to  the  disciples.  Luke, 
who  has  a  great  love  of  miracle,  and  intro- 
duces it  whenever  he  can,  dwells  most  de- 
cidedly on  the  physical  reality  of  the  Lord's 
body,  which  ate  and  drank   in   the   presence 

1  On  this   subject   see  a   remarkable    paper   by  C.   W. 
Emmet,  in  the  Modern  Churchman,  iv.  p.  188. 

19 


290  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

of  the  Apostles.  The  Fourth  Evangelist, 
though  he  says  nothing  of  this,  mentions  the 
doubt  of  Thomas  as  to  the  physical  reality  of 
the  body,  and  how  that  doubt  was  satisfied. 
Even  if  that  story  is  taken  from  Apostolic 
testimony,  we  need  not,  in  view  of  the  beliefs 
of  the  time,  and  our  author's  comparative 
disregard  of  fact,  take  it  too  seriously.  In 
any  case,  here,  as  elsewhere,  when  he  has 
trespassed  on  the  verge  of  materialism,  he 
redeems  the  situation  with  one  of  his  im- 
mortal sentences,  "  Blessed  are  they  that  have 
not  seen,  and  yet  have  believed,"  a  sentence 
torn  fresh  from  the  life  of  the  early  Church. 


XIV 
CHRISTOLOGY 

After  the  statement  given  above  of  my 
views  as  to  the  authorship  and  origin  of  the 
Fourth  Gospel,  it  is  evident  that  I  cannot 
regard  the  Christologic  views  enshrined  in 
the  wonderful  discourses  of  the  Gospel  as 
proceeding  direct  from  the  Jesus  of  history. 
That  indeed  is  a  view  commonly  assumed  in 
the  pulpit  and  in  devotional  literature ;  but  it 
is  not  a  view  which  is  held  by  most  competent 
authorities.  Even  conservative  theologians 
are  ready  to  allow  that  in  those  discourses 
we  must  recognise  not  merely  the  literary 
style  of  a  great  theologian,  but  also  his  turn 
of  thought.  The  only  question — and  it  is 
one  of  great  difficulty  and  complexity — is 
how  far  the  discourses  are  based  on  the 
actual  tradition  of  the  Apostles,  and  how  far 
they  contain  elements  which  can  only  have 
come  into  them  in  the  time  of  the  first 
growth  of  Christianity,  after  the  crucifixion. 

291 


292  THE   EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 


It  is  unnecessary  to  say  much  in  this  place 
as  to  the  basis  of  the  Johannine  Christology 
in  the  experience  of  the  Church,  because  the 
exposition  of  this  relation  has  been  our  main 
theme  throughout.  One  chapter  we  have 
already  devoted  to  the  subject ;  and  it  is 
impossible  to  speak  of  the  Christian  Church 
and  the  Christian  sacraments  without  con- 
tinual reversion  to  it.  We  must  now  content 
ourselves  with  assuming  that  the  translation 
into  a  biography  of  the  experience  of  the 
Christ  who  was  the  Head  of  the  Church  and 
the  constant  source  of  its  life  was  the  one 
great  purpose  of  the  Evangelist. 

One  cannot  doubt  that,  as  the  Evangelist 
often  inserts  in  his  narrative,  on  the  ground 
of  a  special  tradition,  events  and  details  which 
do  not  appear  in  the  Synoptic  Gospels,  so  he 
may  from  time  to  time  record  for  us  sayings 
which  really  come  from  the  Founder,  but 
have  been  in  the  transmission  somewhat 
modified.  But  to  recover  these  original 
sayings  is  a  well-nigh  impossible  task.  The 
writer's  mind  is  so  steeped  in  religious  ex- 
perience that  all  tradition  has  become  trans- 
posed, and  we  have  always  to  regard  his 
repetition   of  traditional   speeches  as  a  com- 


CHRISTOLOGY  293 

pound  of  various  elements.  If  we  compare 
the  traditions  contained  in  all  the  Gospels  to 
sticks  partly  immersed  in  water,  so  that  they 
are  seen  refracted,  then  we  shall  say  that  the 
Marcan,  and  part  at  least  of  the  Matthean 
and  Lucan,  reports  bring  before  us  that  tradi- 
tion but  slightly  refracted,  but  the  Fourth 
Gospel  brings  it  before  us  widely  removed 
from  its  actual  position.  Thus  when  we  pass 
from  the  explication  of  the  elements  in  his 
Christology  which  the  Evangelist  adopts  from 
the  experience  of  the  Church  to  the  investiga- 
tion of  the  elements  which  have  a  root  in 
tradition,  but  are  transformed  in  the  mind  of 
the  writer,  we  pass  from  a  comparatively  easy 
to  a  far  more  difficult  task.  The  history  of 
thought  in  the  Church  for  the  first  three 
centuries  is  largely  the  history  of  Christo- 
logic  doctrine.  This  doctrine  began  to  form 
immediately  after  the  crucifixion,  so  soon 
indeed  that  it  is  scarcely  possible  to  see  un- 
modified the  naked  facts  of  history.  Perhaps 
the  readiest  way  to  trace  the  development 
is  to  set  aside,  as  far  as  may  be,  the  Pauline 
views,  which  are  less  based  on  tradition,  and 
to  look  at  the  text  of  the  Gospels,  which  are 
more  so  based.  In  particular  the  phrase  "  My 
Father  "  in  the  mouth  of  Jesus  is  significant ; 
and  its  use  shows  a  rapid  development.     The 


294  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

phrase  is  distinctive,  as  Jesus  never  says  to 
His  disciples  "  our  Father,"  but  always  "  My 
Father  and  your  Father." 

In  the  Gospel  of  Mark,  Jesus  does  not  use 
the  phrase  "My  Father."  But  in  eschato- 
logical passages  there  is  something  similar. 
In  viii.  38  Jesus  says,  "  Whosoever  shall  be 
ashamed  of  Me  and  of  My  words,  .  .  .  the 
Son  of  Man  shall  be  ashamed  of  him,  when 
He  cometh  in  the  glory  of  His  Father  with 
the  holy  angels."  So  again  in  xiii.  32  we  read, 
"  Of  that  day  and  hour  knoweth  no  one,  not 
even  the  angels  in  heaven,  neither  the  Son, 
but  the  Father."  The  judge  of  mankind,  who 
is  to  come  in  the  clouds  of  heaven,  is  neces- 
sarily a  supernatural  person.  Most  modern 
writers  regard  the  eschatological  element  in 
the  Gospels  as  primitive,  and  think  that  Jesus 
did  speak  of  His  speedy  return  in  glory.  I  am 
not  altogether  convinced  that  this  is  the  case. 
However  this  be,  it  is  noteworthy  that  the 
Jesus  of  Ma?~k  does  not  in  the  course  of  His 
teaching  proclaim  Himself  as  the  Son  of  God,- 
except  when,  in  the  eschatological  passages, 
He  also  calls  Himself  the  Son  of  Man. 

The  tone  of  Luke  is  in  this  matter  similar  ; 
but  there  are  a  few  passages  where  one  hears 
a  different  note.  Some  of  these  again  are 
eschatological.     Thus  in  xxii.  29  we  read,  "  I 


CHRISTOLOGY  295 

appoint  unto  you  a  kingdom,  even  as  My 
Father  appointed  unto  Me,  that  ye  may  eat 
and  drink  at  My  table  in  My  kingdom." 
And  in  xxiv.  49,  "  Behold,  I  send  forth  the 
promise  of  My  Father  upon  you."  Such  at 
least  is  our  English  version ;  but  the  meaning 
of  the  phrase  is  in  my  opinion  very  doubtful. 
There  is,  however,  one  far  more  important 
passage,  which  Luke  (x.  22)  has  in  common 
with  Matthew  (xi.  27) :  "  All  things  have  been 
delivered  to  Me  of  My  Father :  and  no  one 
knoweth  who  the  Son  is  save  the  Father ; 
and  who  the  Father  is  save  the  Son,  and  he 
to  whomsoever  the  Son  willeth  to  reveal 
Him."  In  other  places  in  Matthew  the  phrase 
"  My  Father  "  recurs,  as  in  xvi.  17,  "  My  Father 
which  is  in  heaven,"  and  especially  in  the  very 
striking  passage,  xxvi.  53,  "  Thinkest  thou  that 
I  cannot  beseech  My  Father,  and  He  shall 
even  now  send  Me  more  than  twelve  legions 
of  angels  ? " 

The  only  passage  among  these  which  calls 
for  special  comment  is  that  common  to 
Matthew  and  Luke.  It  is  the  only  passage 
in  the  Synoptic  Gospels  which  bears  a  close 
resemblance  to  a  large  number  of  passages  as 
to  the  relations  of  the  Father  and  the  Son  to 
be  found  in  the  Fourth  Gospel.  Naturally 
it  has    been    much    discussed.     Every  careful 


296  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

reader  will  feel  that  it  is  curiously  different 
from  all  that  goes  before  and  all  that  follows 
it  in  the  two  Gospels.  And  in  Luke  it  dis- 
tinctly comes  in  in  such  a  way  as  to  interrupt 
the  connection — Jesus  is  thanking  the  Heavenly 
Father  that  He  has  hidden  the  coming  of  the 
Kingdom  from  the  wise  and  understanding, 
and  revealed  it  to  babes.  He  continues, 
"  Blessed  are  the  eyes  which  see  the  things 
that  ye  see :  for  I  say  unto  you  that  many 
prophets  and  kings  desired  to  see  the  things 
which  ye  see,  and  saw  them  not ;  and  to  hear 
the  things  which  ye  hear,  and  heard  them  not." 
The  sense  runs  on  with  perfect  clearness. 
But  in  our  text  of  Luke  the  passage  I  have 
quoted  as  to  the  Father  and  the  Son  comes 
in  between  the  saying  that  God  has  been 
pleased  to  reveal  great  things  to  babes  and 
the  saying  that  the  disciples  had  been  greatly 
privileged  to  hear  such  things.  It  seems  to 
me  that,  according  to  all  principles  of  literary 
criticism,  we  must  suppose  that  the  inserted 
words  come  from  some  other  source,  and  are 
badly  dovetailed  in,  or  rather  thrust  in  without 
dovetailing.  In  Matthew,  in  the  same  way/ 
this  saying  is  an  intrusion.  But  of  course 
this  criticism  does  not  touch  the  further 
question  whether  the  source  from  which  the 
words  are  taken  is  one  which  records  genuine 


CHRISTOLOGY  297 

sayings  of  Jesus,  or  whether  it  is  a  document 
which  develops  those  sayings  in  the  direction 
in  which  Christian  thought  was  steadily 
drifting  in  the  second  half  of  the  first  century. 
For  myself,  I  freely  accept  the  second  view. 
We  know  from  recent  discovery  in  Egypt  of 
collections  of  fragmentary  sayings  of  Jesus 
that  such  documents  circulated  at  quite  an 
early  period  ;  and  we  also  know  that  from  the 
very  first  they  were  subject  to  the  influence 
of  the  contemporary  thought  of  the  Church. 
Nor  do  I  believe  that  during  His  earthly 
ministry  our  Lord  gave  utterance  to  meta- 
physical views  such  as  that  in  our  text.  All 
His  teaching  for  which  we  have  satisfactory 
evidence  is  of  quite  another  character.  And 
there  would  be  something  extraordinary,  not 
to  say  paradoxical,  in  thanking  God,  at  one 
moment,  that  the  Gospel  is  revealed  to  babes, 
and  at  the  next  moment  giving  utterance  to 
views  which  the  simple  disciples  of  Galilee 
could  not  understand.  Those  who  regard  the 
life  and  the  words  of  our  Lord  as  quite  super- 
natural and  abnormal  will  not  be  shocked  by 
such  incongruities ;  but  those  who  hold  the 
doctrine  which  has  always  been  maintained 
by  the  Church,  that  Jesus  Christ  was  not  only 
divine,  but  also  perfect  man,  will  expect  to 
find  in  His  words  that  sweet  reasonableness 


298  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

which  one  of  the  greatest  of  modern  critics  has 
singled  out  as  their  most  marked  character- 
istic. In  any  case,  we  may  maintain,  with  no 
fear  of  contradiction  by  any  competent  critic, 
that  the  text  may  quite  well  have  come  into 
the  two  Gospels  from  some  other  source  than 
exact  and  unmodified  tradition. 

One  thing,  however,  is  quite  clear.  Whether 
Jesus  spoke  much  or  little  of  His  relation  to 
the  Father,  such  a  relation,  close  and  perpetual, 
lies  under  the  whole  Synoptic  narrative.  In 
all  the  events  of  life,  and  in  all  teaching,  Jesus 
felt  that  His  mission  was  to  be  of  one  will 
with  the  Father  in  Heaven,  and  to  carry  out 
the  work  among  men  which  He  came  to  do. 
"  Not  My  will  but  Thine  be  done "  is  the 
burden  of  His  whole  life.  The  constant 
presence  and  support  of  the  Spirit  of  God  is 
to  Him  a  perpetual  inspiration.  This  it  is 
which  placed  Him  on  an  entirely  different 
level  from  all  His  contemporaries.  What 
has  been  called  the  God  -  consciousness,  an 
unbroken  communion  with  Divine  goodness 
and  power,  is  exemplified  in  His  life. 

II 

It  is  precisely  this  constant  consciousness  of 
a  Divine  presence,  this  earnest  acceptance  of 
a    Divine   purpose,    which    is   expressed    in  a 


CHRISTOLOGY  299 

great  part  of  the  Fourth  Gospel.     We  may 
feel  that  ever  to  be  conscious  of  this  inspira- 
tion, yet  to  speak  of  it  but  seldom,  according 
to   the    Synoptic    portrait,    is    really   a   more 
sublime   way.       But  the    Fourth    Evangelist 
could  not  be  content  with  this.     In  his  spirit 
that  which   he   felt  to    be  the  truth  and  the 
real  meaning  of  the  Master's  life  burned  its 
way  into  utterance.     The  unity  of  spirit  with 
the    Father,    of  which   Jesus   was   conscious, 
must,  he  thought,  have  been  clear  and  con- 
spicuous to  every  true  disciple.     It  was  the 
dominant  fact  of  the  whole  situation,  occupy- 
ing in  regard  to  the  mere  visible  incidents  of 
life   the  same  relation  which   in   the   kosmos 
spirit   bears   to   flesh.     It   was   quite    in    the 
manner  of  the  time  that,  when  he  began  to 
write   down   an    account  of  the   sayings  and 
doings  of  the  Master,  he  should  bring  to  the 
surface   what   he   regarded  as  the  underlying 
ideas,  represent   Jesus  as  openly  proclaiming 
the   relation   to  the  Father  which  was  really 
implicit,  and  even  in  the  narrative  of  actions 
rather  embody  their  higher  meaning  than  their 
more  obvious  circumstances.     He  forgets  that 
in  living  as  a  man  among  men,  subject  to  the 
most  ordinary  human  needs,  with  limited  know- 
ledge and  human  relationships,  the  Word  must 
have  been  limited  by  the  conditions  of  the  flesh. 


300  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

St  Paul  had  been  faced  by  the  same 
difficulty,  how  the  Spirit  which  was  the  life 
and  inspiration  of  the  Church  could  have 
been  in  a  real  sense  human.  He  meets  it  by 
the  doctrine  of  the  Kenosis  ;  he  teaches  that 
when  the  Lord  came  down  to  dwell  on  earth, 
He  deliberately  emptied  Himself  of  His 
Divine  attributes,  and  accepted  the  limits  of 
ordinary  humanity,  becoming  submissive  to 
pain  and  death.  The  Fourth  Evangelist  does 
not  accept  this  view :  he  thinks  that  from 
Jesus  as  He  lived  on  earth  rays  of  Divine 
glory  frequently  shone  out.  Thus  in  general 
he  rules  out  of  the  life  all  that  in  his  view 
was  unworthy  of  the  Son  of  God.  Yet  he 
was  still  often  under  the  influence  of  tradi- 
tion, and  inserts  human  traits,  sometimes  ex- 
plaining them  away,  sometimes  leaving  them 
in  contrast  with  the  general  tone  of  his 
narrative. 

To  take  a  few  examples.  When  Nathanael 
first  comes  to  Jesus,  He  says  to  the  new- 
comer, "  When  thou  wast  under  the  fig-tree 
I  saw  thee."  Evidently  we  have  here  a  little 
fragment  of  a  story  preserved  like  a  shell  in 
chalk.  The  story  itself  is  not  told,  and  what 
it  may  have  been  we  cannot  conjecture.  But 
the  Evangelist  uses  it  as  an  example  of  a 
more   than   human    knowledge  of  the  hearts 


CHRISTOLOGY  301 

and  thoughts  of  men,  a  sign  of  Divinity.  On 
a  later  occasion,1  Andrew  and  Philip  brought 
to  Jesus  certain  Greeks  who  were  at  Jerusalem 
at  the  time  of  the  feast.  Jesus  naturally 
welcomed  their  homage ;  to  Him  the  friend- 
ship of  no  human  heart  was  indifferent  or 
worthless.  But  the  Evangelist  cannot  bring 
himself  to  regard  so  simple  an  occurrence  as 
trivial ;  he  leads  on  from  mere  recognition  of 
his  Master  by  strangers  to  His  glorification 
and  future  exaltation.  On  the  day  when  Jesus 
was  betrayed,2  the  officers  who  came  out  to 
arrest  Him,  when  He  said  calmly,  "  I  am  He," 
went  backward  and  fell  to  the  ground.  This 
looks  very  much  like  an  exaggeration  into  the 
supernatural  sphere  of  a  natural  feeling  of 
respect  and  compunction  which  the  officers 
may  well  have  felt  in  the  presence  of  Jesus, 
but  which,  according  to  the  Evangelist,  they 
soon  changed  for  one  of  hatred  and  spite. 

The  Jesus  of  the  Evangelist,  like  the  child 
in  Wordsworth,  comes  trailing  clouds  of  glory 
from  heaven,  which  is  His  home.  All  through 
the  writer's  history  of  the  last  days,  though 
he  seems  to  preserve  many  details  of  true 
tradition,  he  is  on  the  watch  to  keep  out 
any  phrases  which  would  seem  to  him  to 
degrade  his  Lord. 

1  xii.  20.  2  xviii.  6. 


302  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

We  cannot  have  a  more  striking  contrast 
between  the  Jesus  of  the  Synoptists  —  the 
Jesus  of  history — and  the  Jesus  of  the  Fourth 
Evangelist,  than  is  shown  in  the  sayings  of 
Jesus  as  to  His  own  death  recorded  in  the 
two  biographies.  In  Mark's  account  of  the 
agony  in  Gethsemane,  Jesus  says,  "  Father, 
all  things  are  possible  unto  Thee ;  remove 
this  cup  from  Me  :  howbeit,  not  what  I  will, 
but  what  Thou  wilt."  What  could  be  more 
touchingly,  more  piercingly  human  ?  Jesus 
is  represented  as  shrinking,  as  any  one  of  His 
followers  might  shrink,  from  the  pain  of 
martyrdom.  Opponents  of  Christianity  have 
found  these  words  weak  and  effeminate  ;  and 
they  have  had  no  difficulty  in  finding  hundreds 
of  heroes  who  have  gone  to  pain  and  death 
not  with  shrinking,  but  with  exultation.  But 
which  course  is  the  higher?  The  height  of 
unchristian  heroism  may  be  found  in  the  Red 
Indian  brave,  who  sang  joyously  as  he  was 
tortured  at  the  stake.  In  his  way  he  was 
splendid.  But  the  Christian  martyr,  with 
more  highly  developed  consciousness,  and 
therefore  with  more  acute  sensitiveness,  feels 
intensely  the  prospect  of  pain  and  death,  but 
yet  is  willing  to  undergo  them  because  it  is 
the  will  of  his  Father ;  and  probably  in  the 
actual  suffering   finds  the  trial   to  which    he 


CHRISTOLOGY  303 

had  looked  forward  after  all  easy  to  bear. 
He  meets  pain  not  with  the  heroism  of  a 
dauntless  will,  but  with  the  certainty  of  Divine 
aid.  If  there  be  any  truth  in  Christianity,  and 
any  meaning  in  history,  his  is  the  nobler  line. 

In  the  account  of  the  Fourth  Evangelist 
Jesus  takes  quite  another  view  : l  "  I  lay  down 
My  life  that  I  may  take  it  again.  No  one 
taketh  it  away  from  Me,  but  I  lay  it  down 
of  Myself.  I  have  power  to  lay  it  down, 
and  I  have  power  to  take  it  again."  The 
Evangelist  felt  so  keenly  the  divine  nature 
of  his  Master,  that  he  could  not  endure  the 
notion  of  His  suffering  at  the  hands  of  men, 
otherwise  than  voluntarily.  But  it  is  obvious 
that  by  taking  this  view,  he  has  deprived  his 
Master,  not  only  of  all  humanity,  but  of  all 
heroism.  His  Jesus  is  not  made  perfect  by 
suffering,  but  raised  above  all  suffering  by 
the  power  of  the  divinity  within  Him. 

Had  the  Evangelist  worked  out  this  view 
with  consistency,  he  would  have  produced  a 
purely  Docetic  doctrine,  and  reduced  the  life 
of  his  Master  to  a  mere  mirage.  From  this 
bottomless  swamp  he  is  rescued  by  a  happy 
inconsistency.  When  he  comes  to  narrate  the 
actual  facts  of  the  crucifixion,  which  he  had 
heard    at   first   or   second    hand    from   actual 

1  John  x.  18. 


304  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

witnesses,  he  does  not  altogether  take  the 
Docetic  view.  Yet  his  narrative  is  very 
different  from  that  of  the  Synoptics,  in  that 
he  does  not  dwell  on  the  agony  of  the  cross, 
and  omits  the  piercing  sayings  which  have 
made  the  story  of  the  cross  one  of  the  greatest 
powers  over  the  human  spirit  which  the  world 
has  known.  The  only  utterances  which,  in  his 
version,  come  from  the  Saviour  on  the  cross, 
besides  the  commendation  of  His  mother  to 
the  beloved  disciple  (probably  a  historic 
detail),  consist  of  the  words  "  I  thirst "  and 
"  It  is  finished."  As  everyone  knows,  a 
terrible  and  burning  thirst  is  one  of  the  most 
poignant  sufferings  of  those  who  are  wounded 
and  tortured.  But  the  Fourth  Evangelist 
does  not  represent  that  thirst  as  a  natural 
one.  "Jesus,  that  the  scripture  might  be 
accomplished,  saith,  I  thirst." 

Yet,  after  all,  he  preserves  the  main  thing, 
that  it  was  the  historic  Jesus  who  sat  wearied 
with  the  journey  by  the  well  of  Samaria,  wept 
by  the  grave  of  Lazarus,  and  perished  on 
the  cross.  The  Word,  after  all,  became  flesh, 
though  the  Evangelist,  after  accepting  this 
bold  statement,  does  a  great  deal  in  the  course 
of  his  narrative  to  empty  it  of  meaning. 

So  in  a  multitude  of  passages  the  Evangelist 
puts  into  words  that  consciousness  of  a  close 


CHRISTOLOGY  305 

relation  to  God  which  Jesus  seems,  as  a  matter 
of  history,  to  have  expressed  seldom  and 
guardedly.  Where  he  is  nearest  to  actual 
history  is  in  the  passages  which  speak  of  Jesus 
in  relation  to  the  Divine  will.  These  passages 
are  many  :  "  My  meat  is  to  do  the  will  of  Him 
that  sent  Me,  and  to  accomplish  His  work  " ; 
"  I  seek  not  Mine  own  will,  but  the  will  of 
Him  that  sent  Me."  Such  sayings  as  these  are 
entirely  in  line  with  others  in  the  Synoptists. 
All  three  of  them1  record  a  saying  of  Jesus, 
when  His  mother  and  brethren  came,  intend- 
ing to  put  Him  under  restraint :  "  Whosoever 
shall  do  the  will  of  God,  the  same  is  My  brother 
and  sister  and  mother."  Tn  the  Lord's  prayer 
the  phrase  "  Thy  will  be  done "  is  very 
prominent.  And  in  the  scene  in  Gethsemane 
we  have  the  same  refrain,  "Not  My  will 
but  Thine  be  done."  Only  the  notion  of  a 
possibility  of  opposition  between  the  will  of 
the  earthly  Jesus  and  the  will  of  the  Father, 
which  is  hinted  at  in  the  scene  at  Gethsemane, 
is  naturally  set  aside  in  the  Fourth  Gospel. 

In  the  Synoptic  Gospels  the  unity  of  will 
and  purpose  between  Jesus  and  the  Father  in 
Heaven  is  much  more  often  assumed  than 
asserted.  Jesus  spoke,  men  felt,  as  one  having 
a  direct  commission  from  above,  and  not  like 

1  Mark  iii.  35,  and  parallels. 

20 


806  THE    EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

the  Scribes.  In  His  miracles  of  healing  He 
does  not  say  "  God  wills  thy  healing,"  but 
"  I  will ;  be  thou  clean."  Though  His  discourses 
are  constantly  revolving  around  the  Father  in 
Heaven,  He  speaks  of  "  My  words "  as  of 
direct  authority. 

The  Jesus  of  the  Fourth  Evangelist,  on  the 
contrary,  is  always  proclaiming  His  close 
relation  to  the  Father.  It  is  not  only  that 
the  Son  is  like  the  Father,  "My  Father 
worketh  until  now,  and  I  work " ;  "  The  Son 
can  do  nothing  of  Himself,  but  what  He  sees 
the  Father  doing " ;  but  a  more  intimate 
relation  still  is  set  forth.  The  Son  fully 
represents  the  Father  on  earth.  "  The  Father 
loveth  the  Son,  and  showeth  Him  all  things 
that  Himself  doeth."  "  If  ye  had  known  Me, 
ye  should  have  known  My  Father  also." 
"  As  the  Father  knoweth  Me,  even  so  know 
I  the  Father."  In  the  passage  which  deals 
with  the  raising  of  Lazarus,  Jesus  is  represented 
as  saying,  "  Father,  I  thank  Thee  that  Thou 
heardest  Me."  This  may  well  be  a  fragment 
of  tradition ;  it  is  thus  that  the  Jesus  of  the 
Synoptists  prays.  But  the  Fourth  Evangelist 
cannot  leave  the  phrase  without  comment ;  he 
adds,  "  I  knew  that  Thou  nearest  Me  always : 
but  because  of  the  multitude  which  standeth 
around  I  said  it,  that  they  may  believe  that 


CHRISTOLOGY  307 

Thou  didst  send  Me."  Finally,  we  have  the 
passage  in  which,  in  his  own  manner,  the 
Evangelist  sums  up  the  situation  in  a  single 
pregnant  phrase,  "  I  and  the  Father  are  one," 
a  phrase  on  which  the  later  discourses  in  the 
Gospel  are  a  commentary.  "  The  glory  which 
Thou  hast  given  Me  I  have  given  unto  them  ; 
that  they  may  be  one,  even  as  we  are  one : 
I  in  them  and  Thou  in  Me,  that  they  may  be 
perfected  into  one."  Here  the  Evangelist  has 
passed  from  the  tradition  altogether ;  he  is 
thinking  of  the  inspiration  of  the  Church,  in 
which  to  him,  as  to  St  Paul,  there  dwells  the 
Christ  who  is  the  same  as  the  Spirit  of  God. 
The  glory  which  was  given  to  the  earthly 
Jesus  has  been  given  also  to  the  Society  which 
continues  on  earth  the  life  of  Christ,  and  by 
that  life  rises  into  unity  with  God.  But  this 
unity  does  not  belong  only  to  earth,  it  stretches 
also  to  the  heaven,  which,  to  the  writer,  is  at 
once  future  and  present :  "  Father,  I  will  that 
they  also  whom  Thou  hast  given  Me  be  with 
Me  where  I  am." 

The  Fourth  Evangelist  not  only  accepts 
from  tradition  accounts  of  the  deeds  of  his 
Master ;  but  he  naturally  also  accepts  some 
of  the  phrases  in  regard  to  Him  current  in 
the  Society.  He  accepts  and  vindicates  his 
Master's  claim  to  the  title  Christ  or  Messiah. 


308  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

This  he  seems  to  do  especially  in  opposition  to 
the  Jews.  He  brings  forward  the  current 
objections  of  the  Jews  to  the  Messiahship  of 
Jesus,  such  as  His  plebeian  origin  and  His 
Galilean  birth-place,  His  neglect  of  the 
Sabbath,  and  the  like,  and  furnishes  replies. 
It  is,  however,  noteworthy  that  the  Evangelist 
does  not  counter  the  Galilean  objection  by 
the  assertion  that  Jesus  was  really  born  in 
Bethlehem.  This  controversial  element,  how- 
ever, is  only  subordinate,  a  sort  of  by-play  in 
the  Gospel.  One  feels  that  the  question  of 
the  Messiahship  has  with  time  become  less 
acute.  The  title  Son  of  Man,  so  frequently 
applied  to  Himself  by  Jesus  in  the  earliest 
tradition,  does  occur  in  the  Fourth  Gospel, 
but  not  with  any  striking  novelty  of  meaning. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  term  Son  of  God, 
which  Jesus  does  not  directly  apply  to  Him- 
self in  the  Synoptic  Gospels,  plays  a  far  greater 
part  in  the  Fourth  Gospel,  as  is  indeed  natural 
after  what  has  been  above  said. 

Ill 

So  far  we  have  little  but  the  immediate 
interpretation  of  experience  and  tradition. 
But  the  tendency  to  speculative  thought 
which  is  clearly  marked  in  the  first  verses  of 
the  Gospel  comes  to  the   surface   in  it  from 


CHRISTOLOGY  309 

time  to  time.  Even  St  Paul,  immersed  as  he 
was  in  practical  life,  had  theories  as  to  the 
pre-existenee  of  Christ ;  the  Evangelist  natur- 
ally speaks  of  the  glory  which  He  had  with  the 
Father  before  the  world  was.  He  came  from 
the  Father,  and  went  back  to  the  Father. 
"  As  the  Father  hath  life  in  Himself,  even  so 
gave  He  to  the  Son  also  to  have  life  in  Him- 
self." In  these  phrases,  which  are  not  promi- 
nent in  the  Gospel,  we  may  find  the  germs 
of  much  theological  speculation  which  was 
already  beginning  to  spring  out  of  the  fruitful 
soil  of  Ephesus.  We  may  regret  that  the 
Evangelist  did  much  to  spoil  his  rich  con- 
tribution to  theology  by  the  narrowness — a 
frequent  accompaniment  of  a  fervent  spirit — 
which  denies  a  share  in  the  Christian  Church 
to  any  who  do  not  hold  the  right  theological 
views.  "  He  that  hath  the  Son  hath  the  life  ; 
he  that  hath  not  the  Son  of  God  hath  not  the 
life."1  We  might  pass  this  as  a  mere  state- 
ment of  experience :  the  writer  saw  that  the 
life  which  is  eternal  in  Christ  belonged  only 
to  the  Christian  Society.  But  when  he  writes, 
"  This  is  the  antichrist,  even  he  that  denieth 
the  Father  and  the  Son,"  we  begin  to  hear  the 
rumbling  of  the  distant  thunder  of  clashing 
creeds,  and  of  the  intolerance  which  would  not 

1   Epistle  v.  12. 


310  THE    EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

allow  that  any  speculative  views  which  are  not 
authorised  by  the  majority  can  be  in  the  way 
of  salvation. 

Of  the  three  great  Christian  doctrines  which 
centre  in  the  person  of  the  Saviour,  the 
doctrines  of  the  Incarnation,  the  Atonement, 
and  the  Exaltation,  the  first  and  third  are  of 
the  essence  of  the  Evangelist's  teaching,  and 
we  have  already  sufficiently  considered  them. 
The  doctrine  of  the  Atonement  is  far  less 
prominent.  In  a  few  phrases,  and  especially 
in  a  verse  in  the  Epistle,  "  the  blood  of  Jesus 
His  Son  cleanseth  us  from  all  sin,"  *  we  seem 
to  have  a  definite  statement  of  the  doctrine. 
Probably  both  St  Paul  and  the  Evangelist 
accepted  that  belief,2  though  with  neither  of 
them  is  it  fundamental,  and  neither  would 
have  adopted  the  doctrine  of  the  Atonement  as 
it  grew  to  be  before  very  long  in  the  Church. 
Salvation  with  both  of  them  consisted  in 
sharing  the  life  of  Christ,  not  in  appropriating 
the  merit  of  His  death. 

Yet  we  must  not  forget  the  degree  to 
which  the  Isaian  picture  of  the  suffering 
servant  of  God  dwelt  in  the  minds  of  the 
early  Christians,  so  as  to  tinge  the  Synoptist 

1  Epistle  i   1,  R.V. 

2  This  statement  modifies  the  view  I  had  expressed  in 
The  Religious  Experieiice  oj  St  Paul,  p.  1 94. 


CHRISTOLOGY  311 

Gospels.  We  have  even  reason  to  think 
that  it  was  accepted  as  referring  to  Himself 
by  the  Saviour.  And  in  the  Isaian  descrip- 
tion the  doctrine  is  clearly  set  forth  that  the 
suffering  of  the  just  has  a  vicarious  efficacy, 
and  tends  to  do  away  with  the  sins  of  the 
erring.  In  such  a  sense  and  so  far,  the 
doctrine  of  the  Atonement  was  clearly  a  part 
of  the  earliest  teaching  of  the  community. 
It  was  only  when  the  thought  of  the  Church 
broke  away  from  its  feeling  and  experience 
that  the  doctrine  became  unreal  and  pedantic, 
as  it  is  in  the  writings  of  Irenasus  and  Ter- 
tullian.1 

In  the  entrance  into  the  Church  of  Platonic 
philosophic  thought  we  must  certainly  see  the 
influence  of  the  Ionian  cities.  At  Ephesus 
the  Christian  Gospel  is  fairly  launched  on  the 
sea  of  theosophical  speculation.  What  we 
call  doctrine  and  the  Roman  Church  calls 
dogma  is  quite  without  roots  in  Jewish  soil. 
It  never  occurred  to  Hebrew  priest  or  prophet 
to  set  forth  a  series  of  statements  as  to  the 
God  of  Israel  which  every  Hebrew  must 
subscribe  under  penalty  of  rejection  from  the 
community.  It  was  the  keeping  of  the  law, 
the  observation  of  ritual  and  festival   which 

1  See  the  Bamplon  Lectures  of  Dr  Hashdall  (not  yet 
published). 


312  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

constituted  Jewish  orthodoxy.  But  Greek 
philosophy  had  long  before  the  Christian  era 
broken  up  into  a  number  of  schools,  each  of 
which  had  formulae  of  its  own  on  the  most 
important  subjects,  and  was  ready  to  defend 
them  in  controversy.  Greek  philosophers  did 
not  persecute  one  another,  perhaps  because 
they  had  no  power  over  the  civil  authorities, 
but  they  regarded  one  another  as  deluded. 

Of  course  the  most  important  contribution 
of  the  Fourth  Evangelist  to  the  foundation 
of  Christian  doctrine  lies  in  his  adoption  of 
the  doctrine  of  the  Logos.  I  do  not  propose 
to  go  with  any  thoroughness  into  the  history 
of  this  doctrine.  That  would  require  a  know- 
ledge of  the  history  of  philosophic  thought, 
and,  I  may  add,  a  taste  for  philosophic  specu- 
lation, to  which  I  can  lay  no  claim.  The 
literature  on  the  subject  is  almost  inex- 
haustible.1 It  seems,  however,  to  me,  that 
those  who  have  written  on  the  subject  have 
seldom  taken  sufficiently  into  account  the 
very  fragmentary  state  of  our  knowledge  of 
the  currents  of  philosophic  thought  in  the 
Hellenistic    age,  which  makes  any  treatment 

1  I  remember,  as  an  undergraduate,  attending  a  course 
of  lectures  by  (the  then)  Professor  Lightfoot,  on  the 
Fourth  Gospel.  By  the  end  of  the  term  he  had  barely 
gone  beyond  the  first  few  verses. 


CHRISTOLOGY  313 

of  the  subject  imperfect.  We  know  that 
Heracleitus  of  Ephesus  had  a  doctrine  of 
the  Logos ;  and  that  there  was  a  school  of 
Heracleitan  philosophy  which  flourished  for 
centuries,  probably  as  much  at  Ephesus  as 
anywhere.  We  know  that  the  Stoics  had  a 
Logos  doctrine  which  was  of  great  importance 
in  their  system.  And  we  know  that  in  the 
teaching  of  Philo,  the  Alexandrian  contem- 
porary of  St  Paul,  teaching  in  regard  to  the 
nature  and  the  functions  of  the  Divine  Logos 
holds  a  great  place.  We  know  also  that  in 
the  Book  of  Proverbs  and  in  the  Jewish 
Apocrypha  the  Word  or  the  Wisdom  of  God 
is  much  spoken  of.  But  these  are  patches  of 
light  in  a  sea  of  darkness.  Our  knowledge 
of  the  philosophy  of  the  Hellenistic  age  is 
very  imperfect.  I  may  be  allowed  to  cite 
an  archaeological  parallel.  We  can  identify 
the  works  of  one  or  two  centres  of  Hellenistic 
art :  Athens,  Pergamon,  Alexandria,  Rhodes, 
Stratonicea.  But  probably  many  great  cities 
at  the  time  had  a  school  of  art  differing  in 
some  respects  from  those  of  their  neighbours. 
And  in  the  case  of  the  great  mass  of  works 
of  sculpture  of  the  period  b.c.  300-1  we 
cannot  definitely  give  them  to  one  school  or 
another.  In  particular  we  know  of  one  or 
two  important  pieces  of  sculpture  signed  by 


314  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

Ephesian  artists :  one  by  Agasias,  son  of 
Dositheus ;  another  by  Agasias,  son  of  Meno- 
philus.  Both  are  admirable  figures  of  com- 
batant warriors.  They  prove  clearly  the 
existence  of  an  important  school  of  sculpture 
at  Ephesus  in  the  second  century  b.c.  But, 
apart  from  their  inscriptions,  we  should  cer- 
tainly have  attributed  them  to  the  great 
school  of  Hellenistic  sculpture  in  Pergamon. 
In  the  same  way,  there  were  no  doubt  in  the 
great  cities  schools  of  philosophy  of  which 
we  have  quite  insufficient  knowledge.  It  is 
notable  that  the  Evangelist  brings  in  his 
sentences  about  the  Logos  as  if  he  were 
stating  something  very  simple  and  undisputed. 
Very  probably  he  takes  for  granted  some 
scheme  of  philosophy  at  the  time  current 
at  Ephesus,  but  to  us  unknown. 

Thus  to  suppose  that  it  was  necessarily 
from  Philo  that  the  Evangelist  took  the 
Logos  doctrine  seems  to  me  quite  unnecessary. 
I  do  not  think  we  can  even  venture  to  say 
that  the  doctrine  is  definitely  Alexandrian, 
among  all  the  lines  of  Hellenistic  thought. 

It  is  the  more  difficult  to  determine  the 
relation  which  the  Logos  doctrine  of  the 
Fourth  Evangelist  holds  to  some  or  all  of  the 
views  known  to  us,  because  he  does  not  go 
into  any  detail.     In  the  first  few  verses  of  the 


CHRISTOLOGY  315 

Gospel  he  slightly  sketches  a  doctrine  of  the 
Divine  Word  as  existing  in  the  beginning 
with  God,  and  as  the  agent  through  whom 
all  things  were  made.  He  says  that  the 
Logos  was  the  source  of  light  to  men,  and 
that  the  Logos  was  divine :  not  that  he  was, 
as  our  version  has  it,  "God."1  He  adds  that 
the  Word  became  flesh,  and  was  so  manifested 
to  the  world  in  the  person  of  Jesus  Christ. 
Then  he  passes  on  to  his  biography. 

It  is  much  to  be  regretted  that  the  English 
version  of  the  first  few  verses  of  the  Gospel 
is  very  misleading.  It  is  a  defect  which  could 
hardly  have  been  avoided,  except  by  the  use 
of  a  long  paraphrase,"  since  it  is  impossible  to 
render  each  Greek  word  by  an  English  equi- 
valent. But  two  phrases  in  particular  cer- 
tainly tend  to  mislead.  "  The  Word  was 
God."  Here  the  Greek,  debs  rjv  6  \6yos, 
means  something  much  more  indefinite :  it  is 
not  6  \6yos  rjv  6  0eo9.  It  might  well  be 
rendered  "  The  Word  was  of  the  nature  of  the 
Divine";  just  as  in  a  later  passage  (iv.  24) 
-nvevfxa  6  Oeos  may  well  be  rendered  "  God  is 
of  the  nature  of  spirit,"  Still  more  perverse 
is  the  rendering,  "All  things  were  made  by 
Him " :  a  far  nearer  translation  would  be, 
"  All  things  came  into  being  through  Him," 
1  See  above,  p.  117. 


316  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

rravra  hi  avTov  iyeuero  ;  and  this  is  almost  a 
repetition  of  the  view  in  Proverbs  (viii.  22-31), 
where  the  Divine  Wisdom  is  spoken  of  as 
present  at  the  creation  of  the  world :  "  Then 
was  I  with  Him  as  a  master- work  man,  and  I 
was  daily  His  delight."  Of  course  in  the 
subsequent  verse,  "  The  Word  was  made  flesh, 
and  dwelt  among  us,"  the  Evangelist  greatly 
adds  to  the  old  doctrine ;  but  that  does  not 
justify  the  translation  of  the  earlier  verse. 

The  originality  of  the  Evangelist  lies,  not 
in  a  new  theory  of  the  Logos,  but  in  his  con- 
ception of  the  embodiment  of  the  eternal 
Word  or  the  eternal  Wisdom  in  the  person 
of  the  Founder  of  Christianity.  His  render- 
ing of  the  biography  which  he  had  to  write 
did  not  depend,  in  fact,  on  any  philosophic 
views,  but  on  the  Pauline  doctrine  of  the 
immanent  Christ,  which  was  a  direct  render- 
ing of  the  experience  of  the  Church.  But  on 
one  point  probably  a  philosophic  tradition 
influenced  him.  He  could  not  bear  to  think 
of  the  Divine  Word  in  the  flesh  as  limited 
in  knowledge  or  liable  to  human  error. 
"  He  needed  not  that  anyone  should  bear 
witness  concerning  a  man,  for  he  knew 
what  was  in  man."1  In  the  Garden  of 
Gethsemane,  "  Jesus  knew  all  the  things  that 

1  John  ii.  25. 


CHRISTOLOGY  317 

were  coming  upon  Him."  l  When  Nathanael 
came  to  Him,  Jesus  showed  such  a  know- 
ledge of-  his  history  as  appeared  to  Nathanael 
supernatural.2  And  so  on  in  other  cases. 
Peter  indeed  says  simply,  "  Thou  knowest  all 
things."3  It  is  quite  true  that  the  highest 
Divine  inspiration  does  impart  to  the  person 
who  is  inspired  a  wisdom  which  comes  from 
above,  and  is  often  of  a  most  striking  kind. 
But  we  have  no  reason  to  think  that  it  im- 
parts true  and  exact  knowledge  in  regard  to 
facts  of  sense  which  are  out  of  the  range  of 
sense.  No  doubt  one  must  speak  cautiously, 
for  modern  psychical  research  seems  to  show 
that  there  may  be  thought-transference  apart 
from  sense-knowledge.  But,  on  the  other 
hand,  psychical  research  does  not  show  that 
such  means  of  knowledge  belong  to  the  best 
and  noblest  of  mankind,  but  rather  to  people 
of  backward  races  and  those  who  are  nervously 
unstable. 

Perhaps  all  that  we  can  say,  in  the  present 
state  of  our  knowledge,  is  that  if  our  Lord 
was  tempted  like  as  we  are,  if  the  life  He  lived 
on  earth  was  a  really  human  life,  we  must 
regard  Him  as  limited  in  knowledge,  just  as 
limited  in  space,  and  limited  to  the  ordinary 
senses,  just  as  capable  of  pain  and  of  sorrow. 

1  John  xviii.  4.  2  John  i.  48.  3  John  xxi.  17 


318  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

Unmeasured  knowledge  would  raise  Him  out 
of  our  reach,  as  much  as  would  insensibility 
to  pain,  which  also  seems  to  be  attained  in 
abnormal  psychical  conditions.  If  we  must 
choose  between  the  Pauline  doctrine  of  the 
kenosis  and  the  Johannine  attempt  to  raise 
the  Founder  while  on  earth  above  earthly 
conditions,  we  should  certainly  choose  the 
former.  The  modern  mind  will,  one  hopes, 
find  a  more  excellent  way  than  either.  But 
that  question  I  must  reserve  to  the  next 
chapter. 


XV 
THE  GOSPEL  AND  MODERNITY 

The  teachings  which  the  world  has  learned 
from  the  Fourth  Gospel  are  so  many  and  so 
great  that  the  Evangelist  stands  in  the  very 
first  rank  of  those  whose  voices  echo  down 
the  ages.  So  spiritual  is  his  doctrine  that 
those  who  walk  after  the  spirit  in  all  ages 
will  be  drawn  to  him  and  follow  his  leading, 
to  the  great  health  of  their  souls.  There  is 
much  less  that  belongs  merely  to  the  time 
and  the  place  than  there  is  even  in  the  Pauline 
Epistles,  less  of  supposed  science,  less  of 
speculative  philosophy,  less  of  views  based 
on  the  temporary  necessities  of  the  Church. 
And  if  the  notions  of  the  Evangelist  in  regard 
to  history  are,  like  those  of  St  Paul,  little  in 
accordance  with  modern  methodic  ways,  yet 
it  is  easy  to  make  allowance  for  this. 

There   is   a   luminous  distinction,  which  is 
developed  and  insisted  on  by  William  James 

319 


320  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

in  his  remarkable  work  on  Varieties  of  Religious 
Experience,  between  the  classes  of  men  whom 
he  calls  the  once-born  and  the  twice-born. 
The  once-born  are  the  healthy-minded  opti- 
mists, who  regard  good  as  naturally  stronger 
than  evil,  to  whom  faith  in  the  Divine  leading 
is  easy,  who  escape  the  severe  crises  of  life. 
The  twice-born  are  the  naturally  pessimistic, 
to  whom  evil  seems  dominant  in  the  world, 
and  who  can  only  escape  into  the  region  of  a 
secure  faith  through  terrible  mental  struggles 
and  sufferings.  The  Gospel  of  Matthew,  in 
its  earlier  part,  with  its  unclouded  confidence 
in  the  Divine  Father  and  in  Providence,  with 
its  delight  in  the  beauty  of  the  two  worlds 
of  nature  and  of  spirit,  is  naturally  akin  to 
the  former  of  these  classes.  St  Paul,  with  his 
crises  and  mental  struggles,  must  for  all  time 
be  the  classic  example  of  the  faith  of  the 
twice-born.  The  Fourth  Evangelist  cannot 
be  summarily  assigned  to  either  class.  He 
insists  strongly  on  the  need  of  a  second  birth. 
Yet  we  do  not  find  in  his  writings  the  traces 
of  constant  warfare  between  flesh  and  spirit 
which  so  deeply  tinge  the  works  of  Paul  and 
of  Augustine.  Faith  in  Christ  is  not  reached 
by  him  through  struggle  and  tribulation  ;  it 
attracts  him  by  its  natural  beauty.  He  is 
led  to  it  by  love,  not  driven  to  it  as  a  means 


THE   GOSPEL   AND    MODERNITY       321 

of  escape.  In  the  Fourth  Evangelist  both 
the  once-born  and  the  twice-born  may  find 
the  greatest  satisfaction  and  the  sweetest 
consolation. 

In  the  preceding  pages  I  have  tried  to  mark 
the  position  of  the  Fourth  Evangelist  in  rela- 
tion to  the  writings  of  early  Christianity  and 
the  life  of  which  they  are  an  embodiment. 
At  present  I  propose  briefly  to  reconsider  his 
main  tenets  in  relation  to  modern  conditions 
and  the  existing  mental  and  spiritual  horizon. 
This  I  will  do  under  five  heads,  considering 
the  Evangelist's  attitude  in  relation  to 

I.  Christian  faith  and  eternal  life, 

II.  The  history  of  the   Founder  of   Chris- 

tianity, 

III.  The  sacraments, 

IV.  The  Church,  visible  and  invisible, 

V.  The  formulation  of  doctrine. 


It  will  be   well  to  go  straight   to  what    is 

the  fundamental  point  in  the  teaching  of  the 

Fourth  Gospel,  that  the  belief,  the  presence 

of  which  makes  a  Christian,  and  the  absence 

of  which  leaves  no  basis  for  Christianity,  is  the 

consciousness  of  a  living  Power,  a  Spirit  ever 

working  in  the  Church,  and  tending  to  the  pro- 
5  21 


THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

motion  in  the  world  of  a  spiritual  kingdom, 
the  Kingdom  of  Heaven  that  is  within  us. 

If  we  try  scientifically  to  classify  beliefs  we 
shall  say  that  this  belief  is  a  species  of  the 
genus  of  religions  which  are  rooted  in  the 
faith  in  an  indwelling  or  immanent  Deity. 
The  teaching  of  the  First  Gospel  is  primarily 
a  doctrine  of  the  divine  transcendence  ;  the 
teaching  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  is  essentially 
a  doctrine  of  the  divine  immanence.  What, 
however,  are  the  marks  which  distinguish  the 
Christianity  of  the  Fourth  Evangelist  from 
other  religions  of  this  genus  ?  They  are 
mainly  two.  In  the  first  place,  the  divine 
immanence  taught  by  this  great  leader  of  the 
Church  is  one  exhibited  upon  earth  in  the  person 
of  the  Founder.  It  is  God  as  revealed  in  the 
life  and  death  of  Jesus  Christ,  as  seen  on 
earth  for  a  time  under  human  conditions, 
who  is  the  Christian  inspiration.  Whether 
God  thus  brought  home  and  revealed  to  men 
be  termed  the  exalted  Christ  or  the  Holy 
Spirit  is  a  matter  of  less  importance,  and  in 
fact  as  regards  that  point  the  various  writers 
of  the  New  Testament  are  not  at  one  among 
themselves.  It  is  the  power,  the  working  of 
the  Spirit  of  which  they  are  intensely  con- 
scious ;  the  intellectual  apprehension  of  it  is 
comparatively  immaterial. 


THE   GOSPEL   AND   MODERNITY       323 

In  the  second  place,  though  the  Spirit  may 
reveal  Himself  to  individuals,  generally  speak- 
ing the  Christian  does  not  stand  as  one  who 
approaches  God  as  an  individual,  but  as  a 
member  of  a  society,  whose  life  in  the  world 
is  a  continuance  of  the  life  of  Christ.  The 
essence  of  Pauline  and  Johannine  Christianity 
is  that  the  Christian  is  a  partaker  of  a  common 
life  which  is  divine  and  eternal.  This  is  their 
idea  of  spiritual  Christianity. 

To  the  Evangelist  the  Christian  communion 
with  the  Divine  appears  to  lead  direct  to 
salvation,  to  the  eternal  life  which  Jesus  came 
to  reveal  to  men,  the  life  which  is  timeless. 
It  dawns  upon  those  who  become  members  of 
the  Christian  Society ;  they  feel  that  it  is  a 
possession  of  the  community  in  which  each 
individual  has  a  part.  And  they  feel  that  it 
abides  also  with  the  Founder  in  the  heavenly 
places.  They  hope  that  at  death,  whatever 
passes  and  is  destroyed,  this  eternal  life  will 
not  pass  away,  but  that  they  will  more  fully 
enjoy  it  in  the  presence  of  their  risen  Lord. 
To  the  Evangelist,  filled  with  this  confidence, 
the  questions  of  eschatology  pass  into  the 
background,  and  become  of  little  importance  ; 
whether  the  scene  of  this  higher  life  be 
a  glorified  and  changed  material  world  or 
an  unknown   spiritual   universe   he   does   not 


324  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

determine.  What  entirely  contents  him  is 
the  view  expressed  in  the  Colossian  Epistle,1 
"  When  Christ,  who  is  our  life,  shall  be  mani- 
fested, then  shall  ye  also  with  Him  be  mani- 
fested in  glory  "  ;  or,  as  the  Evangelist  himself 
puts  it,  "  Where  I  am,  there  shall  ye  be  also."2 

In  the  chapter  dealing  with  eschatology  we 
have  seen  how,  in  the  history  of  Christianity, 
there  are  three  ways  in  which  the  better  hope, 
the  hope  of  life  and  immortality,  has  been 
embodied. 

In  the  very  early  age  the  Jewish  hope  of  a 
Messianic  rule,  of  a  visible  divine  kingdom  set 
up  on  earth,  was  baptised  into  Christianity. 
When  early  Christianity  adopted  it,  it  trans- 
formed it  in  two  ways  :  first,  by  accepting  Jesus 
as  the  Christ,  the  Messiah  who  was  to  bring  in 
the  new  age  and  to  be  king  of  the  new  king- 
dom ;  and,  second,  by  removing  the  hope  from 
a  merely  racial  basis,  and  extending  it  to  all 
who  accepted  the  Christian  Messiah. 

This  was  the  earliest  eschatologic  belief  of 
Christianity.  And  as  extremes  meet,  we  need 
not  be  surprised  to  find  that  the  belief  in  a 
divine  rule,  a  Christian  community  on  earth,  is 
also  the  most  modern.  We  hear  on  all  sides 
that  the  people  are  turning  more  and  more  to  a 
determination  that  a  kingdom  of  righteousness 

1  iii.  4.  2  John  xiv.  3. 


THE   GOSPEL   AND    MODERNITY       325 

and  justice  must  be  possible  here  on  earth,  and 
to  a  conviction  that  those  who  give  their  lives  to 
the  endeavour  to  bring  in  such  a  kingdom  are 
the  truest  followers  of  Jesus  Christ.  Among 
ourselves,  as  among  the  ancient  Jews,  this 
enthusiasm  is  greatly  mixed  with  materialism, 
with  an  exaggerated  belief  in  the  value  of 
things  which  can  be  seen  and  enjoyed.  Often 
a  mere  improvement  in  the  physical  condition 
of  the  masses  of  the  people  is  spoken  of  as  if 
it  would  ensure  happiness  and  spiritual  health. 
There  is  here  a  great  deal  of  illusion ;  yet  one 
would  not  wish  to  say  a  word  against  a  hope 
which  inspires  thousands  of  men  and  women 
to  endure  suffering  atid  death  in  the  hope  of 
preparing  for  their  children  and  their  country- 
men a  brighter  and  more  serene  life,  Instead 
of  protesting  against  such  belief  it  is  best  to 
try  to  supplement  it,  in  the  spirit  of  the 
Master's  saying,  "  Man  shall  not  live  on  bread 
alone,  but  by  every  word  that  proceedeth  out 
of  the  mouth  of  God." 

The  second  way  in  which  the  aspiration 
after  a  higher  life  was  embodied  in  early 
Christianity  was  in  a  belief  in  a  great  judg- 
ment of  souls  and  their  assignment  to  a 
spiritual  realm  of  happiness  or  misery,  ac- 
cording as  their  life  on  earth  had  been  one 
of  beneficence  or  of  evil  doing.     The  germ  of 


THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

this  view  must  be  sought  in  the  Far  East ;  it 
was  brought  to  the  West  from  Egypt  and 
Babylon  by  the  mystery  religions  of  the 
Hellenistic  age,  by  which  Judaism  itself  was 
largely  influenced.  In  formed  Christianity 
the  ideas  of  Heaven,  Hell,  and  Purgatory  as 
places  for  departed  souls  were  dominant ;  but 
their  gates  were  guarded  by  the  forces  of  the 
Church,  and  opened  not  necessarily  in  accord- 
ance with  the  ethical  character  of  the  dead, 
but  with  reference  also  to  his  beliefs,  and  his 
obedience  to  the  Church.  It  is  very  hard  to 
say  how  far  a  belief  in  the  rewards  and 
penalties  of  a  future  life  dominate  the  thoughts 
of  English  people  at  the  present  day,  or,  what 
is  more  important,  regulate  their  conduct. 
The  tradition  is  strong,  and  among  the  less 
highly  educated  parts  of  the  community  it 
probably  acts  subconsciously,  rising  to  the 
surface  in  hours  of  stress  or  in  prospect  of 
death.  But  I  think  it  is,  in  the  mass  of  the 
people,  certainly  decaying,  with  effects  for 
good  and  for  evil  which  it  is  hard  to  measure. 
Among  more  thoughtful  people  the  belief  is 
much  refined  and  etiolated :  probably  few 
believe  that  the  soul  dies  with  the  body ;  but 
of  the  future  beyond  death  men  seldom  speak, 
and  seldom  have  a  clearly  formulated  belief. 
No    doubt    in   a   rude   and   unbridled    age 


THE    GOSPEL   AND   MODERNITY       327 

crude  and  vivid  beliefs  as  to  future  rewards 
and  punishments  are  of  immense  value  in 
curbing  the  passions  of  men,  and  leading 
them,  if  not  to  repentance,  at  least  to  peni- 
tence and  restitution.  But  such  beliefs  are 
not  at  a  high  ethical  level,  and  when  once 
they  have  fallen  into  decay  their  materialism 
is  apt  to  be  treated  even  with  ridicule. 

In  particular  some  of  the  leaders  of  the 
proletariate  are  strongly  convinced  that  the 
traditional  doctrine  of  Heaven  and  Hell  tends 
to  thwart  and  maim  those .  attempts  at  the 
improvement  of  social  and  material  conditions 
from  which  they  hope  everything.  They  are 
persuaded  that  the*  Churches  foster  this 
doctrine  in  order  that  the  well-to-do  may 
enjoy  the  things  of  this  life,  and  hold  up 
before  the  poor  the  hope,  which  they  deem 
illusory,  of  retribution  in  a  future  state. 
Hence  the  teaching  of  Heaven  and  Hell 
seems  to  them  anti-social,  and  they  condemn 
it  in  no  measured  terms.  They  may  be 
partly  right ;  but  they  are  certainly  largely 
wrong.  Let  us  by  all  means  do  what  we 
can  to  improve  the  distribution  of  wealth  and 
to  redress  social  inequalities,  but  the  whole 
history  of  the  world  proves  that  the  peoples 
who  content  themselves  with  aiming  at 
worldly  prosperity  and  do  not  trouble  about 


328  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

the  infinite  possibilities  and  eternal  destinies 
of  the  soul  do  not  find  what  they  seek.  All 
true  progress  must  have  a  spiritual  side.  As 
Mrs  Browning  has  written,  "  It  needs  a  high- 
souled  man  to  move  the  masses  even  to  a 
cleaner  stye."  And  the  high-souled  man  will 
not  and  cannot  think  the  health  of  the  spirit 
and  its  high  hopes  beyond  the  present  life  a 
matter  of  indifference.  If  we  discard  the 
too  crude  notions  of  the  Middle  Ages  as  to 
the  doom  of  souls,  we  must  in  some  way 
preserve  the  high  spiritual  truths  which  found 
incorporation  in  those  beliefs,  or  we  shall 
revert  to  barbarism.  No  higher  or  greater 
thing  is  produced  on  the  earth  than  a  noble 
personality ;  and  that  this  personality  should 
at  death  simply  disappear  is  not  to  be 
thought ;  though  in  what  way  it  survives  is 
a  matter  not  of  knowledge  but  of  hope. 

The  third  way  in  which  Christianity  received 
the  higher  hope  is  the  mystic  way  of  a  belief 
in  a  higher  spiritual  life,  not  only  lying  in  the 
future,  but  around  us  here  and  now.  When 
thought  began  to  realise  the  superiority  of 
the  spiritual  element  in  life  to  the  material 
elements,  and  to  recognise  the  transitory  and 
evanescent  character  of  the  latter,  it  fled  for 
a  refuge  to  the  belief  in  a  great  spiritual 
realm  of  which  all  the  visible  and  tangible  is 


THE   GOSPEL   AND   MODERNITY       329 

but  a  faint  and  vanishing  reflex.  Such  views, 
developed  in  full  force  among  the  sages  of 
India  and  Persia,  were  inculcated  in  Greece 
by  the  Platonic  schools  of  philosophy.  Mean- 
time, the  psalmists  and  prophets  of  Juda?a  had 
received  parallel  beliefs,  altered  in  accordance 
with  the  far  more  definite  and  powerful 
theology  of  Judaea.  The  great  thinkers  of 
early  Christianity,  Paul  and  the  Fourth 
Evangelist,  baptised  these  spiritual  ideas  into 
Christianity,  chiefly  by  means  of  their  con- 
viction that  the  source  of  all  life  and  light  was 
the  Exalted  Christ. 

They  also,  in  a  sense,  narrowed  these  ideas 
by  holding,  as  they  certainly  did,  that  only  by 
a  conscious  acceptance  of  the  Exalted  Saviour 
could  a  man  enter  into  the  higher  life.  It  is 
open  to  us  to  think  that,  like  the  great  thinkers 
of  all  ages,  they  were  right  in  what  they 
affirmed  rather  than  in  their  denials.  History 
has  given  us  unnumbered  instances  which 
show  how,  through  Christian  faith,  Christians 
have  attained  to  the  highest  life.  But  there  is 
no  need  to  deny  that  for  those  outside  Chris- 
tianity God  may,  in  His  mercy,  provide  other 
ways  for  attaining  that  life,  though  in  a  less 
perfect  degree. 

In  all  ages  of  Christianity  spiritual  idealism 
has   been  the  dominant  note  in   the  writings 


330  THE   EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

of  the  great  teachers  of  the  Church.  But  it 
would  be  a  mistake  to  think  that  it  is  peculiar 
to  the  highly  educated,  that  it  can  only  be 
reached  by  profound  thought.  It  can  also  be 
attained  by  a  kind  of  religious  intuition.  Men 
and  women  of  quite  ordinary  intellectual 
attainments,  but  endowed  with  a  deep 
spiritual  sense,  live  constantly  in  communion 
with  the  unseen ;  their  thoughts  and  hopes 
are  set  on  things  not  attainable  by  bodily 
sense,  but  revealed  to  the  heart.  Amid  the 
bufferings  of  fortune  and  the  losses  which 
come  to  all  of  us,  they  can  realise  that  these 
calamities  are  but  an  outward  show,  and  that 
a  peace  which  is  beyond  their  reach  rests  upon 
those  who  live  in  harmony  with  the  Divine 
will,  and  in  practice  of  love  to  God.  Nor  do 
such  souls  fear  that  death  will  have  power  to 
tear  them  away  from  such  higher  communion  ; 
it  can  only  remove  them  to  another  province 
of  the  spiritual  world. 

II 

But  the  Fourth  Gospel,  as  we  have  abund- 
antly seen  in  the  course  of  this  work,  is  not 
merely  spiritual.  It  fully  recognises  that  since 
man  has  a  body  as  well  as  a  spirit,  it  was 
necessary  that  the  Word  should  become  flesh. 
The  Evangelist  believed  that  his  Master  had 


THE    GOSPEL   AND   MODERNITY       331 

done  mighty  works,  had  opened  the  eyes  of 
the  blind,  and  even  raised  the  dead.  He  held 
the  belief,  in  his  time  universal,  that  a  Saviour 
sent  into  the  world  must  be  able  to  work 
miracles,  and  that  if  He  had  not  done  so,  the 
disbelief  of  the  Jews  would  have  been,  in  a 
measure,  justified ;  at  all  events,  inevitable. 
Those  who  were  not  attracted  by  His  spiritual 
teaching  might  well  believe  in  Him  for  the 
works'  sake. 

Judging  from  the  practical  point  of  view, 
it  must  be  reckoned  as  a  great  merit  in  the 
Evangelist  that  he  did  not  allow  spiritual 
passion  to  carry  him  entirely  away.  Defective 
as,  from  the  modern'  point  of  view,  his  notion 
of  history  is,  yet  he  was  right  in  insisting  on 
the  historic  character  of  the  great  events  in 
the  life  of  the  Founder.  The  reality  of  the 
revelation  of  the  Divine  Word  under  the 
forms  of  space  and  time  was  felt  by  the 
teachers  of  the  early  Church  to  be  a  matter 
of  life  and  death.  Those  who  regarded  that 
life  as  a  mere  appearance  or  mirage  preserved 
the  possibility  of  a  philosophic  religion,  but 
not  of  a  Christian  Church.  Ignatius,  writing 
to  the  Church  at  Tralles *  early  in  the  second 
century,  puts  the  matter  clearly  :  "  Be  ye  deaf, 
therefore,  when  anyone  speaketh  unto  you 
i  Ch.  ix. 


332  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

apart  from  Jesus  Christ,  who  was  of  the  race  of 
David,  who  was  born  of  Mary,  who  was  truly 
born,  ate  and  drank,  was  truly  persecuted 
under  Pontius  Pilate,  was  truly  crucified  and 
died,  in  the  sight  of  the  things  that  are  in 
heaven  and  on  earth  and  under  the  earth ; 
and  was  truly  raised  from  the  dead,  His 
Father  having  raised  Him  up." 

So  much  of  historic  fact  the  Evangelist 
saw  to  be  indispensable  to  Christian  belief. 
And  so  had  St  Paul  judged  before  him : 1  "  I 
delivered  unto  you  first  of  all  that  which  also 
I  received,"  and  he  goes  on  to  mention  the 
death  and  resurrection  of  his  Master.  And  in 
our  own  day  it  is  impossible  that  the  Church 
should  survive  as  an  institution  if  she  gave  up 
the  historic  reality  of  her  Founder, — though  in 
regard  to  the  details  of  His  life  every  modern 
mind  is  obliged  to  take  a  more  critical  view 
than  was  possible  in  the  early  ages  of  Chris- 
tianity— or  abandoned  her  conviction  as  to 
the  general  character  of  His  deeds  and  words. 

The  scientific  view  of  history,  as  an  evolu- 
tion manifested  in  time  and  showing  a  regular 
succession  of  cause  and  effect  rather  than  as 
a  series  of  unconnected  views  picturesque  but 
irrational, — this  view  has  come  to  stay.  In 
all  the  universities  of  Europe  and  America 
1  1  Cor.  xv.  3. 


THE   GOSPEL   AND   MODERNITY       333 

it  has  made  steady  progress,  until  now  it  has 
hardly  any  serious  opposition  to  encounter 
from  -those  who  reflect. 

In  the  wake  of  physical  science  history  has 
turned  towards  research,  towards  the  investi- 
gation of  document  and  of  monument,  towards 
the  ranging  of  facts.  Historians  give  their 
lives  to  the  study  of  original  authorities,  to 
the  weighing  of  evidence,  to  an  earnest  and 
prolonged  endeavour  to  ascertain  what  really 
happened  in  the  periods  of  which  they  treat. 
History,  of  course,  must  always  have  another 
side :  the  side  of  ideas.  The  historian  is  not, 
like  the  investigator  in  natural  science,  a  man 
without  bias,  aiming" only  at  the  ascertainment 
of  fact.  History  is  closely  connected  with 
practical  life ;  and  the  historian  is  commonly 
inspired  for  his  task  by  the  hope  of  throwing 
from  the  past  a  light  upon  the  present. 
While  he  is  a  historian,  he  is  at  the  same  time 
a  politician,  or  a  person  belonging  to  a 
particular  school  in  religion,  in  sociology, 
or  in  ethnology.  Subjective  and  a  priori 
tendencies  can  never  be  shut  out  of  the  writ- 
ing of  history  :  it  is  essentially  an  ethical  task.1 

1  In  view  of  the  terrible  events  now  taking  place  in 
Europe,  I  cannot  help  saying  that  false  and  unworthy 
views  as  to  idea  in  history  may  so  far  prevail,  even  in  the 
case  of  those  well  exercised  in  historic  method,  as  to 
pollute  the  whole  of  historic  study  with  disease. 


334  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

We  have  to  consider  what  are  the  results 
upon  modern  conceptions  of  Christianity 
which  flow  from  both  these  historic  tendencies  : 
the  tendency  to  an  exact  and  realistic  study 
of  the  sequence  of  events  in  the  past,  and  the 
tendency  to  regard  all  human  history  in  an 
ethical  or  dynamic  way,  as  the  manifestation 
of  spiritual  tendency  and  divine  idea. 

There x  has  been  of  late  a  strongly  marked 
tendency  among  writers  in  Germany  and 
England  to  concentrate  attention  on  the 
human  life  of  the  Founder  of  Christianity, 
and  the  Synoptic  Gospels  in  which  it  is 
reported  in  the  most  objective  and  simple 
way.  The  attempt  was  to  throw  a  strong 
historic  light  on  the  Christian  origins ;  to 
exhibit  the  drama  as  it  actually  took  place 
with  the  walls  of  Jerusalem  and  hills  of  Galilee 
for  a  background.  That  process  has  gone  on 
and  is  still  going  on. 

It  has  been  a  work  of  great  intellectual 
enterprise  and  force.  Some  writers  declare 
it  to  be  the  greatest  intellectual  achievement 
of  our  time.  The  background  against  which 
the  drama  of  salvation  was  played  out,  Pales- 
tine and  the  Grseco-Roman  world,  has  come 
out  most  vividly,  and  the  gracious  figure  of 

1  The  following  paragraphs  are  from  the  Modern 
Churchman,  July  iyi4. 


THE   GOSPEL   AND   MODERNITY       335 

the  Master  who  taught  as  never  man  taught, 
and  lived  as  never  man  lived,  stands  out  more 
clearly.  But  of  course  it  would  be  absurd 
to  represent  the  process  as  one  only  of  gain. 
The  result  has  been  that  the  super-normal  and 
miraculous  element  in  that  life  has  dwindled. 
And  to  many  excellent  Christians  this  must 
seem  a  loss.  Such  often  say  with  Mary, 
"  They  have  taken  away  my  Lord,  and  I 
know  not  where  they  have  laid  Him."  And 
yet,  after  all,  Mary  came  to  realise  that  it  was 
really  a  step  in  her  Master's  exaltation  which 
had  taken  Him  away.  Only  what  was 
material  had  disappeared  ;  and  the  reply  of 
the  angels  comes  down  the  ages :  "  He  is  not 
here,  He  is  risen." 

The  greatest  of  our  losses,  which  may  how- 
ever in  the  long  run  be  for  the  good  of  the 
Church,  lies  in  our  changed  view  of  the 
Fourth  Gospel:  I  do  not  wish  to  speak  too 
dogmatically,  since  I  know  that  many  good 
critics  still  hold  to  the  Johannine  origin,  and 
the  historic  exactness,  of  this  Gospel.  I  am 
convinced,  however,  that  we  shall  have  to  give 
up  this  view,  that  we  shall  be  obliged  to  allow 
that  though  the  Fourth  Gospel  contains  valu- 
able historic  material,  yet  what  is  its  main 
treasure,  the  speeches  of  our  Lord  contained 
in    it,    belongs    not    to    the    lifetime    of    the 


336  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

Founder,  but  to  the  early  experience  of  the 
Church.  And  I  am  also  convinced  that  when 
once  we  have  made  up  our  minds  to  this 
change  of  view,  we  shall  in  the  end  more  fully 
realise  the  value  of  the  writings  of  the  first 
and  greatest  of  the  Christian  mystics. 

Yes,  there  has  been  loss  as  well  as  gain. 
We  live  in  a  country  of  business  men.  When 
one  of  them  makes  a  loss  what  does  he  do  ? 
He  faces  the  facts,  refuses  to  deceive  him- 
self, writes  off  bad  debts,  introduces  better 
machinery,  and  often  more  than  regains  what 
he  has  lost.  May  not  the  Church  do  the 
same  ? 

Thus  we  need  not  despair  if  our  gain  in 
historic  outlook  has  been  in  some  of  us  accom- 
panied by  a  certain  amount  of  disillusion  and 
disappointment.  It  seems  that  we  cannot 
from  mere  outward  and  visible  fact  gain  a 
clear  perception  of  the  vast  spiritual  revolu- 
tion which  was  taking  place  in  the  world. 
While  we  realise  that  if  we  had  been  in  bodily 
presence  in  Jerusalem  or  Galilee  at  the  time 
we  should  have  seen  and  heard  many  of  the 
things  which  the  Synoptists  report,  we  also 
realise  that  it  was  not  by  the  senses  only  that 
the  true  inwardness  of  Christianity  could  be 
grasped.  It  seems  to  me  that,  as  the  first 
apostles  of  Christianity  were  defective  through 


THE   GOSPEL   AND   MODERNITY       337 

the  narrowness  of  their  horizon,  and  because 
they  saw  Christianity  too  exclusively  under 
material  conditions,  and  in  a  Jewish  setting, 
so  it  has  been  with  Christianity,  and  not  least 
with  the  Reformed  Churches,  in  the  last 
centuries. 

Their  conception  of  Christianity  also  has 
been  too  much  coloured  with  Judaism  ;  they 
have  regarded  Christianity  too  exclusively  as 
a  religion  which  sprang  up  at  a  particular  time 
and  in  a  definite  place,  and  not  as  the  con- 
summation of  the  religion  of  the  world.  To 
Catholics  Christianity  presents  itself  too  much 
as  a  supernatural  system  introduced  into  the 
world  by  a  supernatural  person,  who,  by 
miracle,  proved  Himself  to  be  divine,  and  to 
have  a  right  to  set  forth  for  all  time  the 
conditions  of  salvation,  which  are  enforced 
by  a  church  of  which  the  clergy  have  super- 
natural powers.  And  most  Protestants, 
though  they  profess  the  belief  that  the  Spirit 
of  Christ  still  dwells  in  and  guides  the  Church, 
yet  are  closely  bound  to  the  letter  of  the  New 
Testament,  which  they  in  practice  regard  as 
an  infallible  guide. 

A  way  of  escape  from  our  difficulties  may 

perhaps  lie  in  following  a  line  like  that  taken 

in  the  first  century  by  St  Paul  and  the  Fourth 

Evangelist.     These  great  writers  did  things  for 

22 


338  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

nascent  Christianity  without  which  the  Chris- 
tianity we  know  of  could  not  have  come  into 
existence.  They  reduced  the  materialist  ele- 
ment in  Christianity  and  increased  the  spiritual 
element.  St  Paul,  as  he  himself  is  careful  to 
tell  us,  knew  but  little  of  the  earthly  life  of 
his  Master,  nor  did  he,  when  he  had  oppor- 
tunities, curiously  inquire  about  it.  He  knew 
in  fact  little  more  of  it  than  a  frankly  sceptical 
school  of  German  criticism  would  leave  us. 
The  two  facts  of  it  which  seemed  to  him  of 
supreme  importance  were  the  death  on  the 
cross  and  the  resurrection,  or  continued  life  in 
the  Church,  two  facts  of  the  most  objective 
history.  The  Fourth  Evangelist  deliberately 
sets  himself,  all  through  his  Gospel,  to  correct 
the  historic  tradition  of  his  Master's  life,  and 
to  bring  out  its  spiritual  and  inner  meaning. 
If,  as  a  historian,  he  sets  before  us  a  being  who 
could  never  have  walked  the  soil  of  Palestine, 
he,  as  a  theologian,  laid  the  foundations  of 
mystic  Christianity  for  all  time.  For  the 
teaching  of  the  Virgin-birth  he  substitutes 
the  doctrine  of  the  Logos.  Like  St  Paul,  it 
is  Christ  exalted  and  Christ  the  life  of  the 
Church  that  fills  his  mind  and  heart. 

A  great  part  of  what  are  taken  by  modern 
uninstructed  Christians  for  necessary  sides  of 
Christian    belief— assertions    as    to    events   in 


THE   GOSPEL   AND   MODERNITY       339 

the  life  of  the  Founder — are  not  really  at  all 
of  the  essence  of  Christianity,  and  are  only 
supposed  to  be  so  in  consequence  of  perverted 
education.  According  to  the  old  proverb,  a 
little  knowledge  is  a  dangerous  thing.  And 
the  result  of  a  superficial  training  in  science 
and  history  in  a  modern  school  is  often  to 
produce  in  the  mind  of  the  learner  an  ex- 
tremely shallow  conviction  of  the  all-import- 
ance of  literal  accuracy  in  the  statement  of 
fact,  and  a  want  of  comprehension  of  the  ex- 
tremely modern  character  of  this  tone  of  mind. 
To  a  mind  thus  attuned  the  Gospel  history 
is  either  literally  true  or  a  congeries  of  false- 
hoods :  the  phrases  of  the  Creed  express  liter- 
ally a  number  of  facts  as  to  the  Divine  nature, 
or  they  are  a  dreadful  delusion.  Most  of  us 
are  so  wrapped  up  in  the  things  of  sense  that 
we  take  spiritual  truths  to  be  not  symbolic 
statements,  but  prosaic  assertions  of  fact. 

Such  a  frame  of  mind  is  very  hard  to  modify. 
And  while  many  men  are  in  it,  any  attempt  to 
throw  the  early  Christian  teaching  into  true 
historic  perspective,  and  to  show  how  much 
more  important  are  ideas  and  tendencies  than 
visible  facts,  must  have  great  danger.  It  is 
hard  to  persuade  such  literalists  that  what  we 
are  criticising  is  not  any  necessary  part  of 
Christianity,  but  only  a  modern  mirage  of  it. 


340  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

The  best  that  one  can  hope  is  that  the  mirage 
is  by  degrees  becoming  more  dim,  while  the 
reality  which  it  so  delusively  reflects  is  grow- 
ing clearer. 

Ill 

The  Evangelist  attaches  great  value  to  the 
Christian  sacraments  of  Baptism  and  the 
Lord's  Supper.  Such  outward  and  visible 
means  of  appropriating  the  grace  ever  flow- 
ing from  the  Head  of  the  Church  into  her 
body,  he  saw  to  be  necessary,  if  the  Church 
was  to  persist  in  the  world  as  a  visible 
organisation.  Against  their  abuse,  against 
any  notion  that  they  had  a  magical  value,  he 
warns  his  disciples.  The  notion  that  men  can 
by  the  mere  performance  of  certain  rites  draw 
down  to  themselves  the  grace  of  God  finds 
no  place  with  him.  Such  a  notion  in  his  time 
only  belonged  to  the  more  retrograde  and 
materialist ;  in  the  Pauline  Churches  it  could 
find  no  place.  The  Evangelist  counters  it 
with  his  immortal  saying,  "  The  wind  bloweth 
where  it  listeth."  But  he  saw  that  to  any 
organised  Church  some  sacraments  were 
necessary.  He  would  see  at  Ephesus  how 
in  every  one  of  the  pagan  religious  societies, 
the  thiasi  of  I  sis  and  Kybele  and  Mithras, 
such   sacraments   naturally   grew  up.     So  he 


THE   GOSPEL   AND   MODERNITY       341 

avoids  alike  the  materialism  which  soon  becran 
to  invade  the  Christian  sacraments,  and  the 
ultra-spiritualism  which  was  destined  soon  to 
mislead  the  Montanists,  and  to  drive  them 
into  wild  and  unregulated  excesses. 

Human  nature  being  what  it  is,  had  the 
Evangelist  entirely  overlooked  the  need  of 
sacraments,  his  Gospel  would  have  been  a 
far  poorer  gift  to  mankind.  There  will 
always  be  many  in  the  Christian  society  to 
whom  such  rites  are  quite  necessary,  who 
without  them  would  feel  that  Christianity 
was  evanescent  and  would  fall  away.  The 
study  of  history  establishes  in  the  clearest 
way  the  need  of  outward  ordinances.  And 
spiritual  Christianity,  while  looking  beyond 
the  mere  outward  rite,  will  never  dare  to 
despise  it.  On  the  contrary,  the  deeper  study 
of  psychology  in  our  day  has  proved  to  what 
an  extent  outward  rites  may  react  on  inward 
feeling,  may  serve  as  a  means  of  stimulating 
and  preserving  spiritual  enthusiasms.  If  there 
arises  among  more  sensuous  natures  a  tendency 
to  overvalue  these  "  means  of  grace,"  the 
Christian  to  whom  they  are  less  attractive 
and  less  necessary  will  view  this  tendency, 
unless  carried  to  the  extreme  of  materialism 
and  magic,  with  a  respectful  sympathy.  ^Vhen 
we  consider  what  the  great  sacraments  have 


342  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

been  in  the  history  of  the  Church,  we  must, 
in  spite  of  their  great  liability  to  abuse,  allow 
their  Divine  origin  and  sanction.  The  solitary 
thinker  and  writer  is  naturally  drawn  towards 
the  doctrine  of  the  Spirit,  and  is  apt  to  over- 
look the  corporate  needs  of  the  Church.  But 
those  who  have  the  practical  guidance  of  the 
Christian  Society  will  set  a  higher  and  a 
juster  value  upon  the  visible  and  tangible 
means  of  grace.  It  is  one  of  the  clearest 
proofs  of  the  inspiration  of  the  Evangelist 
that  his  book  gives  satisfaction  to  both  of 
these  tendencies. 

IV 

In  another  matter,  the  outward  organisa- 
tion of  the  Church,  we  cannot  expect  much 
definite  teaching  from  the  Evangelist.  In  his 
time  the  first  fervour  of  the  Christian  move- 
ment was  not  exhausted.  The  local  Churches 
were  scarcely  organised ;  they  were  small 
democracies  or  theocracies  under  the  immediate 
governance  of  the  Spirit.  A  vivid  picture  of 
their  constitution  and  their  proceedings  is 
given  by  St  Paul  in  his  first  Corinthian 
Epistle  (chap.  v.).  The  faithful  are  to 
assemble  together,  and  to  expel  from  the 
community  by  a  popular  vote  any  person  who 
degrades  the  Church  by  an  evil  life.     If  there 


THE    GOSPEL   AND    MODERNITY       343 

were  at  the  time  Bishops,  which  is  possible, 
but  not  certain,  they  were  only  executive 
officials  chosen  from  among  the  Elders.  I  do 
not  think  that  we  can  find  anywhere  in  the 
Fourth  Gospel  any  hints  in  regard  to  the 
external  organisation  of  the  Church.  Had 
St  Paul  been  writing  at  the  time,  he  could 
not,  with  his  genius  for  organising,  have 
entirely  passed  by  the  questions  of  Church 
officials,  of  the  relation  to  the  surrounding 
heathen,  and  the  like.  But  the  Evangelist, 
even  in  his  Epistle,  does  not  concern  himself 
with  such  questions. 

It  cannot  be  denied  that  as  the  Church  took 
up  a  more  defined  position  in  relation  to  the 
State,  and  in  relation  to  the  surrounding 
heathen  society,  some  hardening  of  her  crust 
was  necessary ;  some  organisation  inevitably 
took  place.  And  for  such  organisation 
abundant  models  existed  in  the  cities  of  Asia 
Minor,  which  were  accustomed  to  manage 
their  own  affairs  in  all  smaller  matters,  as 
well  as  in  Jewish  Synagogues  and  Pagan 
thiasi.  There  is  no  need  to  say  anything  here 
as  regards  this  development,  for  it  is  posterior 
to  the  age  with  which  we  deal.  It  has  been 
in  most  respects  justified  by  success.  But 
the  question  what  organisation  is  best  for 
various  branches  of  the  Church  is  a  large  one. 


344  THE    EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

What  St  Paul  and  the  Fourth  Evangelist  had 
at  heart  was  the  internal  unity  of  the  Church 
as  the  body  of  Christ  on  earth,  every  member 
of  which  was  in  close  relation  to  every  other 
member.  The  only  unity  which  they  recognise 
is  a  unity  of  spirit. 

Like  so  many  of  the  spiritual  teachings  of 
St  Paul  and  St  John,  the  doctrine  of  the 
Church  has  been  accepted  by  those  of  a 
materialist  turn  of  mind  in  a  materialist  sense, 
and  for  unity  of  spirit  they  have  read  unity 
of  government.  As  a  matter  of  history,  the 
outer  unity  of  the  Church  has  never  been 
complete.  From  the  first,  small  sections  of 
the  Church  preferred  autonomy,  and  broke 
away  from  the  main  body.  And  before  the 
power  of  the  Roman  Popes  was  fully  estab- 
lished there  came  alienation  between  East 
and  West,  which  destroyed  all  possibility  of 
external  unity.  Since  the  Reformation  there 
has  not  been,  even  in  Western  Europe,  unity 
of  Church  Government;  nor,  so  far  as  anyone 
can  see,  is  there  the  least  probability  that  such 
unity  can  ever  be  established.  It  is  more 
than  doubtful  whether  such  unity  of  govern- 
ment would  be  a  thing  desirable,  even  if  it 
could  be  settled  on  reasonable  grounds.  The 
nations  of  Europe,  east  and  west,  north  and 
south,   so    differ    in    character    and    political 


THE   GOSPEL   AND   MODERNITY       345 

genius  that  different  kinds  of  government, 
alike  in  Church  and  State,  are  necessary,  if 
each  is  to  remain  true  to  the  national  bent, 
and  to  do  in  the  world  the  work  committed 
to  it  by  the  Divine  Ruler.  But  what  can  be 
aimed  at  is  a  federation  of  Church  with 
Church,  a  federation  by  which  each  may 
retain  its  special  character,  and  yet  be  on 
friendly  and  tolerant  relations  with  the  rest. 
And  the  spiritual  ideal  of  universal  sympathy 
and  love  of  Christian  for  Christian  stands 
before  us  as  clearly  as  ever  since  the  first  days, 
while  the  more  easy  and  rapid  communications 
of  modern  times  make  the  expression  of  the 
feeling,  if  the  feeling  'exist,  more  easy.  Could 
there  have  arisen  before  our  times  such  a 
movement  as  that  of  the  Christian  Students' 
Union  ?  Could  mutual  friendship  of  the 
Churches  in  the  mission-field  have  been  so 
clearly  forced  upon  us  ? 


We  come  finally  to  the  vexed  and  difficult 
question  of  Christian  doctrine  and  the  Creeds. 
It  results  from  the  discussion  in  the  last  chapter 
that  the  creed  of  the  Evangelist  is  nothing 
like  so  definite  as  popular  theology  supposes. 
Hasty  readers  take  detached   phrases  of  the 


346  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

English  version,  "  The  Word  was  God,"  "  I  and 
the  Father  are  one,"  and,  reading  them  in  the 
light  of  the  familiar  Creed,  think  that  the  whole 
matter  is  simple.  But  these  phrases  in  Greek 
to  the  people  of  the  time  would  have  had  a  far 
more  vague  meaning.  The  first,  as  I  observed 
in  the  last  chapter,  is  of  very  indefinite  mean- 
ing, and  may  perhaps  best  be  rendered  by  "  The 
Word  was  of  divine  nature."  And  the  second 
phrase  may  be  rendered,  "  I  and  the  Father  are 
indissolubly  united  "  (ev  ia-jxev).  To  suppose 
that  such  phrases  can  be  used  as  clear-cut 
propositions  in  a  logical  construction  is  absurd. 
We  have  to  approach  them  not  from  the  plat- 
form of  the  Creed,  but  from  the  ground  of  the 
earliest  Christian  teaching. 

The  Synoptic  Gospels,1  invaluable  as  they 
are,  the  sources  of  our  knowledge  of  the  life 
and  teachings  of  our  Founder,  do  not  greatly 
help  us  in  dealing  with  the  philosophical  and 
doctrinal  aspects  of  Christianity.  It  is  true 
that  here  and  there  in  these  narratives  we  catch 
a  glimpse  of  something  more  than  human,  a 
broken  light  of  the  eternal  shining  in  a  mun- 
dane setting.  But  so  long  as  their  Master  was 
with  them  in  the  flesh,  the  problems  of  Chris- 
tology  could  scarcely  arise  for  the  Apostles.    It 

1  The  following  paragraphs  are  from  The  Modern  Church- 
man, July  1911. 


THE    GOSPEL   AND   MODERNITY       347 

was  after  His  departure,  in  the  middle  of  the 
first  century,  that  they  began  to  press.  The 
first  writer  to  give  to  them  any  definite  answer 
was  St  Paul.  St  Paul  must  not  be  held  re- 
sponsible for  the  schemes  of  doctrine  which 
subsequent  writers  have  grafted  upon  his 
words.  But  he  was  a  deep  thinker ;  and  he 
lived  in  the  full  stress  of  the  religious  awaken- 
ing  to  which  he  tried  to  furnish  ways  of 
thought.  If  his  mental  training  was  in  a 
measure  perverted  by  rabbinic  subtleties  and 
logomachies,  he  yet  lived  in  places  where  the 
light  of  Greek  culture  was  shed  abroad,  and  he 
had  a  great  sensitiveness  to  what  was  best  in 
his  religious  surroundings. 

To  the  twelve  their  Master  must  have 
appeared  at  first  as  a  Jewish  prophet ;  later 
they  came  to  think  of  Him  as  the  Messiah  ; 
and  after  the  crucifixion  they  began  to  realise 
that  what  they  had  witnessed  was  really  the 
crowning  revelation  of  God  to  man.  But  they 
still  clung  to  the  belief  in  their  Master's  speedy 
return  in  the  clouds  of  heaven ;  they  thought 
that  He  had  come  for  the  sake  of  the  Jewish 
race  only.  The  horizon  of  St  Paul  and  the 
Fourth  Evangelist  is  quite  different.  It  is 
enlarged  by  baptising  into  Christ  much  that 
was  best  in  the  religions  of  the  world  at 
the  time.     Greek  monotheism,  the    Hellenic 


348  THE   EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

doctrine  of  the  Word,  the  mysticism  of  Egypt 
and  the  East,  were  all  absorbed  into  the  ex- 
panding life  of  the  society,  and  were  all  trans- 
muted by  the  ever-working  Spirit  of  Christ 
into  forms  suited  for  His  own  dwelling-place. 
Christ  as  the  heavenly  life  of  the  Church,  and 
the  Church  as  the  earthly  body  of  Christ,  grew 
together  and  expanded  until  they  became  the 
supreme  religious  phenomenon  of  the  age  ;  and 
after  the  last  rival  of  Christianity,  Mithraism, 
had  been  overthrown,  they  absorbed  all  the 
springs  of  religion  into  one  great  river  of  God. 

Formula?  may,  from  certain  points  of  view, 
be  desirable  or  necessary.  But  we  must  be 
careful  not  to  overestimate  them.  At  best 
they  are  approximations,  relative  truths  in 
relation  to  experience  and  action,  not  the  em- 
bodiment of  any  absolute  or  scientific  truth. 

If  we  compare  the  writings  of  St  Paul  and 
St  Luke  we  shall  at  once  see  how  unconscious 
those  writers  were  of  any  formal  doctrinal 
views  on  the  subject  of  the  Trinity.  In  Acts 
the  striking  religious  phenomena  which  marked 
the  first  age  of  Christianity,  and  the  spiritual 
powers  exercised  by  the  Apostles,  of  course 
Divine  in  origin,  are  repeatedly  spoken  of  as 
gifts  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  St  Paul  sometimes 
speaks  of  them  in  the  same  phraseology.  But 
when  he  is  writing  of  the  peace  and  joy,  the 


THE   GOSPEL   AND   MODERNITY       349 

salvation,  which  belongs  to  believers,  he  often 
regards  them  as  the  result  of  the  working  of 
the  Spirit  of  Christ,  or  of  the  exalted  Christ  in 
the  Church.  And  in  some  passages  he  iden- 
tifies the  Holy  Spirit  with  the  Spirit  of  Christ. 
It  is  abundantly  clear  that  he  does  not  try  to 
make  any  metaphysical  distinctions  in  regard 
to  the  Trinity.  He  is  speaking  of  the  facts  of 
Christian  experience,  and  the  words  which  he 
uses  are  not  the  expression  of  any  developed 
theological  system,  but  come  fresh  from  the 
heart.  I  do  not  say  that  such  merely  approxi- 
mate ways  of  speaking  should  or  could  have 
been  kept  up  in  the  Church.  But  at  least  we 
have  a  warning  not  "to  regard  exact  theology 
as  necessary  to  Christianity. 

The  Fourth  Evangelist's  attitude  in  regard 
to  Creed  differs  somewhat  from  that  of  St 
Paul.  Whereas  the  intellectual  element  in 
his  creed  is  less  developed,  he  clings  to  it  with 
more  passion.  He  does  not  see  the  need  of 
such  a  theory  of  kenosis  as  we  find  in  St  Paul, 
a  theory  intended  to  explain  the  relation  of 
the  historic  to  the  spiritual  Christ,  though  it 
must  be  added  that  St  Paul  merely  states  the 
view  in  one  passage,  and  does  not  work  it  out 
in  any  detail.  The  Evangelist,  after  stating 
his  logos  doctrine,  does  not  analyse  it ;  and 
although  he  represents  Jesus  in  a  supernatural 


350  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

aspect,  he  does  not  try  closely  to  connect  that 
aspect  with  points  of  the  logos  doctrine  as  held 
by  those  with  whom  he  was  conversant.  The 
complete  freedom  of  self-determination,  and 
the  miraculous  powers  which  he  attributes 
to  his  Master,  are  not  the  fruits  of  wisdom  so 
much  as  of  character  and  spiritual  supremacy. 
Yet  he  is  very  severe  on  those  who  throw  any 
doubt  on  the  divine  sonship ;  and  in  the  divine 
sonship  he  includes  a  complete  monopoly  of 
the  way  of  approach  to  God.  If  the  Epistle 
be  by  the  Evangelist,  he  goes  so  far  as  to 
say  that  denial  of  the  divine  sonship  of  his 
Master  is  antichrist,  and  an  utter  rejection  of 
saving  truth.  Yet  there  is  a  great  difference 
between  his  intolerance,  if  we  must  so  call  it, 
and  the  intolerance  of  the  Church  at  a  later 
time,  inasmuch  as  the  denials  which  he  views 
with  horror  are  not  denials  of  any  mere  intel- 
lectual statement,  but  denials  of  the  principle 
of  Christian  life,  as  he  understands  it. 

St  Paul  and  the  Fourth  Evangelist  clearly 
saw  that  the  doctrine  of  an  indwelling  Christ 
in  the  Church  needed  guarding.  They  held 
that  if  an  exalted  Christ  was  the  light  of  the 
Church,  it  was  Christ  arisen  and  glorified  who 
was  thus  exalted,  not  a  human  Jesus  translated 
into  heavenly  places.  St  Paul  is  quite  clear 
on  this  point.     Christ,  he  says,  when  He  came 


THE   GOSPEL   AND   MODERNITY        351 

on  earth,  emptied  Himself  of  His  divine  pre- 
rogative, took  upon  Him  the  form  of  a  slave 
(for  that  is  the  real  meaning  of  the  word 
doulos),  and  submitted  to  human  conditions, 
even  to  death,  whereupon  God  highly  exalted 
Him.  The  Fourth  Evangelist  more  closely 
identifies  the  Jesus  of  history  with  the  exalted 
Christ,  but  he  does  so  by  constructing  for  Jesus 
on  earth  an  ideal  life,  from  which  weakness  and 
human  limitations  are  excluded,  although  here 
and  there  a  touch  of  naturalism  comes  in. 

It  would  take  us  too  far  if  I  tried  at  this 
point  to  collate  these  views  with  those  pre- 
valent in  modern  Christianity  and  those  which 
appear  to  belong  to  th'e  future.  Certainly  in 
modern  England  the  teaching  of  the  Living 
Christ  has  been  far  more  strongly  dwelt  on 
than  the  doctrine  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  Chris- 
tian experience  has  been  interpreted  rather 
in  the  light  of  the  former  teaching  than  in 
that  of  the  latter.  All  that  need  be  said  here 
is  to  insist  that  both  teachings  alike  have 
Apostolic  authority  ;  both  alike  have  a  great 
place  in  the  history  of  the  Church.  Every 
Christian  has  the  right  to  interpret  his  ex- 
perience in  the  light  of  either,  accordingly  as 
nature  and  intellectual  tendency  may  dictate. 
If  a  man  choose  to  speak  of  the  Christian  life, 
with  its  aspirations,  its  hopes,  and  its  beliefs,  as 


352  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

the  result  of  the  inner  working  of  the  Holy 
Spirit,  he  speaks  with  St  Paul  and  with  St 
Paul's  Master.  If  a  man  prefer  to  regard  it 
as  the  outward  result  of  the  life  of  Christ  in 
the  soul,  he  again  speaks  with  St  Paul  and 
the  Fourth  Evangelist,  to  whom  we  owe  the 
eternal  parables  of  the  body  and  the  members, 
and  the  vine  with  its  branches. 

Offshoots  of  the  logos  doctrine  have  con- 
stantly arisen  during  the  history  of  Christian- 
ity. But  so  long  as  the  Jewish  cosmogony 
was  regarded  as  history,  they  could  only  take 
a  very  imperfect  form.  When  the  doctrine  of 
evolution  came  to  hold  the  field,  an  immense 
future  was  opened  for  them.  When  two 
points  are  accepted,  first  that  the  Universe  is 
the  result  of  Divine  reason  and  goodness,  and 
second,  that  Christianity  is  the  consummation 
of  human  progress,  to  which  the  process  of  the 
ages  leads  up,  then  we  have  a  scheme  to 
which  only  some  form  of  the  logos  doctrine 
corresponds.  In  H.  Drummond's  Ascent  of 
Man  we  have  a  Christian  logos  doctrine  put 
in  popular  form.  In  the  philosophy  of 
Bergson,  for  instance,  we  have  the  basis  of 
what  may  be  a  logos  doctrine  adapted  to 
modern  intellectual  conditions.  When  the 
old  view  of  a  series  of  special  creations  was 
given  up,  its  place  could  only  be  taken  either 


THE   GOSPEL   AND   MODERNITY       353 

by  a  materialistic  theory  like  that  of  Haeckel. 
or  by  some  form  of  logos  theory,  since  it  is 
impossible  that  Christianity  should  be  left  on 
one  side  in  any  idealist  view  of  creation. 


VI 

The  times  in  which  we  live  are  in  some 
respects  singularly  like  the  time  of  early 
Christianity.  Then  the  Roman  Empire  had 
spread  over  all  the  Mediterranean  lands  u 
veneer  of  material  civilisation,  travelling  had 
become  easy,  and  life  ran  on  smooth  wheels. 
The  same  result  has  been  produced  in  modern 
days  by  our  discoveries  and  inventions,  the 
use  of  steam  and  electricity,  the  cult  of 
hygiene,  the  general  spread  of  comfort.  Then 
the  wide  use  of  the  Greek  language,  and  with 
it  of  Greek  science  and  philosophy,  had  pro- 
duced a  high  general  intellectual  level  among 
the  more  leisured  classes :  all  who  thought, 
thought  under  Greek  conditions.  A  similar 
intellectual  condition  has  now  arisen  from  the 
dominance  of  science  alike  in  our  knowledge 
of  the  material  world,  and  in  our  study  of  man 
and  his  history.  From  England  and  America 
to  India  and  Japan,  a  common  intellectual 
groundwork  is  laid  down ;  and  men  from 
farthest   East   and   farthest   West   can   meet 

23 


354  THE   EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 

in  conference  and  congress,  and  find  them- 
selves in  thorough  understanding  with  one 
another,  making  the  same  assumptions  and 
pursuing  the  same  investigations. 

Even  in  the  matter  of  religion  the  re- 
semblance between  the  age  of  the  Cassars 
and  ours  is  striking.  Then  in  all  countries 
the  ancestral  religions,  consecrated  by  long 
use  and  adorned  with  pomp  and  riches,  were 
giving  way,  and  their  place  was  being  taken 
by  new  enthusiasms,  starting  from  the  body 
of  the  people,  but  looked  on  with  sympathy 
by  such  of  the  cultured  people  as  were  not 
satisfied  with  Greek  religious  philosophy.  In 
the  same  way,  now,  in  Europe,  in  India,  in 
China,  popular  religion,  in  spite  of  occasional 
recrudescence,  is  slowly  being  sapped  and 
vanishing,  while  all  kinds  of  new  enthusiasms 
and  forms  of  belief  are  rising  and  claiming 
their  place.  The  gap  between  the  beliefs  of 
the  highly  educated  and  the  populace  is  grow- 
ing, and  has  grown  until  it  is  an  obvious  danger 
to  society.  The  rise  and  spread  of  new  sects 
— the  Christian  Scientists,  the  Mormons,  the 
Futurists,  and  so  forth — is  notable  in  England 
and  America ;  and  though  few  of  these  sects 
can  offer  any  serious  reasonable  defence  of 
their  tenets,  they  are  by  multitudes  accepted, 
and  accepted  with  enthusiasm. 


THE   GOSPEL   AND   MODERNITY       355 

But,  it  will  be  said,  granting  a  similarity  in 
conditions  between  the  age  of  the  Caesars  and 
ours,  where  shall  we  look  for  a  start  for  the 
revival  of  faith  ?  We  cannot  expect  a  St  Paul 
to  arise  ;  and  the  intellectual  conditions  which 
made  the  Fourth  Gospel  possible  no  longer 
exist.  It  is  quite  true  that  the  age  does  not 
seem  to  encourage  the  rise  of  great  person- 
alities. We  cannot  hope  that  one  man  will 
arise  to  adapt  Christianity  to  new  conditions. 
But  how  if  the  place  of  great  personalities  may 
be  taken  in  a  measure  by  movements,  by  great 
currents  in  the  moral  and  intellectual  worlds  ? 

In  the  first  place,  I  would  suggest  that 
modern  historic  criticism,  in  destroying  our 
confidence  in  the  literary  records  of  early 
Christianity,  has  done  a  work  in  some  ways 
parallel  to  the  work  of  St  Paul  and  his  school. 
Even  sceptical  criticism  leaves  us  with  a 
more  definite  information  as  to  the  life,  the 
words  and  deeds  of  the  Founder  of  Chris- 
tianity than  was  possessed  by  St  Paul.  If  the 
miraculous  halo  round  His  figure  is  fading, 
the  severest  investigation  leaves  us  with  a 
conviction  that  our  Master  claimed  a  unique 
relationship  to  the  Father  in  Heaven,  that 
never  man  spake  as  He  spake,  that  in  His  life 
the  will  of  God  was  more  fully  revealed  than 
in  all  the  rest  of  history.     But  still,  the  fading 


356  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

of  material  knowledge  throws  us  back  on 
the  life  of  the  spirit ;  and  we  realise  with 
St  Paul  that  it  is  the  Spirit  in  the  Church 
which  is  the  great  gift  of  Jesus  Christ  to 
mankind.  We  are  driven,  like  our  Evangelist, 
from  letter  to  spirit,  from  reliance  on  a  life 
lived  in  space  and  time  to  a  reliance  on  a  life 
which  is  eternal  in  heaven. 

And  though  no  one  in  our  day  would  venture 
to  write  a  life  of  Christ  according  to  the  spirit, 
yet  has  not  the  study  of  nature  and  of  man 
shown  us  in  recent  years  more  and  more 
clearly  the  truth  of  the  Johannine  teaching 
that  the  material  is  unreal  and  evanescent, 
and  the  spiritual  is  the  truly  abiding,  and  the 
source  of  the  life  which  is  eternal  ?  1  will 
not  speak  of  the  growing  spirituality  of  the 
study  of  matter.  What  more  concerns  us  is 
the  result  of  the  study  of  the  unconscious  in 
man,  and  the  spiritual  world  in  which  he 
dwells  like  a  fish  in  the  ocean.  The  trickery 
and  imposture  which  have  accompanied  the 
experiments  of  the  professed  spiritualists,  the 
low  level  of  the  morality  of  their  lives,  have 
disgusted  many  earnest  students,  and  made . 
them  turn  away  from  such  experiments  as 
revealing  rather  diabolic  than  divine  influences. 
With  this  revulsion  I  sympathise ;  yet  surely 
some  of  the  well-established  facts  of  spiritual- 


THE    GOSPEL  AND   MODERNITY       357 

ism,  the  transference  of  thought  from  person  to 
person,  or  the  remarkable  dominance  of  will 
and  belief  over  what  is  merely  material,  are  of 
the  utmost  importance  to  our  views  on  the 
subject  of  religion.  We  are  gaining  a  concep- 
tion of  a  realm  beyond  and  above  the  visible 
world,  which  seems  to  make  impossible  in 
the  future  any  merely  material  or  magical 
conception  of  religion. 

I  cannot  but  think  that  this  great  widening 
of  our  horizon  will  have  a  strong  and  stimu- 
lating effect  on  many  of  our  religious  beliefs. 
It  will  raise  our  belief  in  the  spiritual  basis  of 
life,  and  show  us  that  it  is  the  spirit  that 
quickeneth,  the  flesh  profiteth  nothing.  It 
will  make  a  revolution  in  our  notion  of  death, 
and  bring  life  and  immortality  to  light.  What- 
ever we  may  think  of  spiritualism,  spirituality 
has  become  a  more  reasonable  explanation  of 
the  world,  and  a  kind  of  Christian  mysticism 
more  possible.  In  mysticism  in  the  past  there 
has  been  as  much  dregs  as  in  other  forms  of 
religion ;  it  has  been  allied  with  astrology, 
with  magic,  with  self  -  hypnotism,  with 
hysteria ;  but  there  is  in  it  a  deep  well  of 
truth,  and  a  certain  strain  of  it  is  as  essential 
to  all  higher  religion  as  a  certain  proportion 
of  oxygen  is  to  the  air  we  breathe. 

Everyone  must  feel  that  there  is  a  new  stir 


358  THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 

in  Christianity.  Activity  in  the  mission-field, 
and  the  rise  of  such  important  movements  as 
that  of  the  Christian  Students,  compel  Chris- 
tianity to  modify  its  formula?,  and  to  take  on 
new  aspects.  The  last  decades  of  the  nine- 
teenth century  were  a  time  of  comparative 
inertia  in  Christianity :  with  the  new  century 
fresh  life  has  begun  to  come  into  the  Christian 
Churches.  Those  who  attended  the  remark- 
able meeting  at  Edinburgh  a  few  years  ago 
speak  of  it  almost  with  awe,  as  of  a  time 
when  the  Spirit  of  God  was  sensibly  present, 
and  an  outpouring  like  that  at  the  first  Whit- 
suntide took  place.  The  Church  has  to  live 
up  to  that  standard. 

But  movements  like  the  Christian  Student 
movement,  the  new  spirit  in  our  missions, 
the  Christian  Social  Union,  are  all  at  present 
in  the  making.  And  the  necessary  intel- 
lectual basis  has  not  been  thought  out.  This 
is  a  work  which  naturally  falls  on  Broad 
Churchmen,  and  it  is  one  of  the  most  im- 
perative needs  of  the  age.  None  of  us  can 
hope  to  do  more  than  contribute  a  few 
elements  to  the  necessary  reconstruction  of 
Christian  theology ;  but  light  is  coming  in 
from  many  sides  ;  and  the  attitude  of  earnest 
welcome  to  any  light,  however  broken,  is  the 
one  which  best  becomes  us. 


INDEX 


Acts  of  the  Apostles,  21,  27  seq., 

33,  65,  I35>  157,  159,  197,  226, 

232,  247,  250,  348. 
Alexander  the  Great,  10,  H,  17. 
Alexandria,  its  influence,  overrated 

compared  to  that  of  other  Greek 

cities,  59,  75,  313. 
Amazons,  in   relation  to  worship 

of  Artemis,  4. 
Androclus,   mythical     founder    of 

Ephesus,  3.  ■ 

Antioch,  relation  to  Ephesus,  37, 

47- 
Antony  (Mark)  enlarges  sanctuary 

of  Artemis,  5 
Apocalypse,  the,  2S,  34  set].,  40, 

43  seq.,  172,  223,  234. 
Apuleius,  190. 
Aquila  in  Ephesus,  20,  32. 
Artemis  of  Ephesus,  worship  of, 

3,  8,  25,  34,  250. 
Asiarchs,  23. 
Atonement,      doctrine      of,      not 

fundamental   in   St    Paul  or  in 

Fourth  Gospel,  310. 

Babylon,  influence  of,  4,  7. 

Bacon,  B.  W.,,53. 

Baptism,  see  Sacraments. 

Baur  on  Paulinism,  38. 

"  Beloved  Disciple,"  the,  40,  69 

seq. ,  84,  288. 
Bezalel,  145. 


Caesar       (Julius), 
Ephesians,  18. 


deified        by 


Caiaphas,  77. 

Capernaum,  Jews  of,  114. 

Catacombs,  paintings  of  the,  209, 
240  seq. 

Celsus,  235. 

Ceiinthus,  49,  So. 

Charles,  Dr  R.  II.,  168. 

Christ,  Pauline  teaching  of,  ^5, 
115,  128;  and  Church  in 
Fourth  Gospel,  129  seq.  ;  in- 
dwelling, 154  seq.,  316,  322  ; 
exalted,  19.2  seq. ,  243  seq.,  329. 
See  also  Jesus  and  Christology. 

Christology  of  Fourth  Gospel, 
291-318,  322  seq. 

Church,  the,  Pauline  doctrine  of, 
128,  221  ;  in  Fourth  Gospel, 
129  seq.  ;  as  distinguished  from 
the  world,  236-255  ;  organisa- 
tion of,  342  seq.  See  also 
Sacraments. 

Clementine  Recognitions,  the,  88. 

Coinage  of  Ephesus,  II. 

Colossians,  Epistle  to  the,  31. 

Corinth,  differences  from  Ephesus, 

3°- 
Corinthians,  First  Epistle  to,  26, 

127,  196.  342. 
Corinthians,    Second    Epistle    to, 

26,  29,  127. 
Cornelius,  222. 
Council  of  Ephesus,  49. 
Creeds,    the,    345  seq.      See   also 

Christology. 
Croesus,  King  of  Lydia,  2,  8. 
Cumont,  45. 


359 


360 


THE   EPHESIAN   GOSPEL 


Dale,  Dr  A.  W.,  85. 
Daniel,  188. 

Demetrius  of  Ephesus,  24. 
Docetism,  286,  303.     See  Gnostic- 
ism. 
Doutte,  277. 
Drummond,  H. ,  352. 

Ecclesiasticus,  205. 

Ephesians,  Epistle  to  the,  31. 

Ephesus,  early  history  and  char- 
acter, 1-18  ;  St  Paul  in,  19-33  ; 
after  St  Paul,  34-81  ;  St  Paul 
writes  from,  197,  200,  314. 

Eschatology,  167  seq.,  324  seq. 

Eternal  life,  138  seq.,  177-188, 
323  seq. 

Ethics  of  Fourth  Gospel,  256 
seq. 

Eucharist,  see  Sacraments. 

Eusebius  (historian),  141. 

Evil  spirits  in  Fourth  Gospel, 
161. 

Forgiveness  of  Sin,  130  seq. 

Galatians,  Epistle  to  the,  127. 

Gnosticism,  49,  80  seq.,  90,  270. 

Gospel,  the  Fourth,  relation  to 
Ephesus,  53  seq. ;  authorship, 
54  seq.  ;  character  of  composi- 
tion, 56  seq.  ;  allegory  in,  57 
seq.  ;  sources  of,  66  seq.  ; 
spirituality  of,  75  seq. ,  91  ; 
materialist  element  in,  80  seq., 
146  ;  origin  and  purpose  of,  86 
seq.  ;  its  writer's  idea  of  bio- 
graphy, 92-123  ;  its  basis  in 
Christian  experience,  124-140; 
use  of  the  term  spirit  in,  146 
seq.  ;  eschatology  and  doctrine 
of  eternal  life  in,  163,  188  ; 
sacraments  in,  194,  213;  in 
relation  to  Judaism,  219-235  ; 
on  the  Church  and  the  world, 
236-255  ;  ethics  of,  256  seq.  ; 
miracle  in,  271  seq.  ;  its  Chris- 
tology,  291,  322  seq. ;  lack  of 
historicity,  335  seq. 


Hebrews,  Epistle  to,  58,  79, 
Heracleitus  of  Ephesus,  his. philo- 
sophy, 9,  10,  258,  313. 
Koltzmann,  H.,  67. 
Homer  on  Truth,  260. 

Ignatius,  St,  on  fighting  with 
wild  beasts,  27  ;  his  letter  to 
Ephesians,  47  seq. ,  331. 

Jackson,  Dr  H.  Latimer,  quoted, 

73- 
James,  William,  319  seq. 

Jesus,  faith  of,  19  ;  name  of,  21, 
22,  62  ;  sayings  of,  62  seq., 
73,  82  seq.,  96  seq.,  147  ;  His 
eschatology,  171  seq.,  192,  197  ; 
baptism  of,  19S  ;  restriction  of 
mission,  216,  219  seq.,  238  seq., 
261,  265,  296  seq.,  332  seq. , 
358.     See  also  Christ. 

Jews  and  Judaism,  17,  19,  20 seq., 
33  seq.,  45,  61,  65,  114  seq., 
126,  167,  206  ;  relation  of  Juda- 
ism to  Gospel,  214-235,  337. 

John  the  Baptist,  his  disciples  in 
Ephesus,  19,  87,  198,  200,  216, 
232,  285  seq.,  286. 

John  the  Presbyter,  16,  42. 

John  the  Prophet,  author  of  the 
Apocalypse,  16,  41. 

John,  St,  First  Epistle  of,  40,  42, 
65,  155  172,  186  seq.,  13, 
310. 

John,  St,  Secondand  Third  Epistles 
of,  42  seq. 

John  the  son  of  Zebedee,  16,  39 
seq.,  41  seq.,  49,  69  seq.,  84,  141. 

Jiilicher  quoted,  39. 

Judaism,  see  Jews. 

Justin,  226. 

Kennedy,  Dr  H.  A.  A.,  193. 

Kenosis,  Pauline  doctrine  of,  300. 

Lazarus,  resurrection  of,   174,  282 

seq. ,  304. 
Liberty  in  relation  to   truth,  271 

seq. 
Lightfoot,  Bishop,  62. 


INDEX 


361 


Logos,  doctrine  of  the,  33,  44,  82, 
187,  210  seq.,  225,  285,  304, 
312  seq.,  346  seq. 

Loisy,  Dr  Alfred,  53,  202. 

Love,  Christian,  136  seq.,  272  seq. 

Luke,  St,  on  Paul  in  Ephesus, 
20  ;  on  laying  on  of  hands,  21  ; 
his  account  of  riot  at  Ephesus, 
25  ;  his  purpose  in  writing 
Gospel,  95  ;  relation  to  Mark, 
95  ;  and  Q,  96  seq.  ;  on  Scrip- 
ture, 149  ;  on  the  Spirit,  150 
seq.,  179,  211,  218,  222,  2S5, 
289,  295  seq. 

Lysander,  worship  of,  by  Ionians, 
17. 

Lysimachus,  Ephesus  enlarged 
by,  3- 

Magic,  22,  47,  151. 

Marcion,  38. 

Mark,    St,    68,    84,  95,    117,    172 

seq.,    179,   196,  204,  215,  224, 

294,  302,  305. 
Mary  Magdalene,  1605^.,  288.  " 
Matthew,    St,    65,    95    seq.,   149, 

J79>    197   seq.,    211,  215,  216, 

224,    228,    232,   279,   285,  295 

seq. ,  320. 
Megabyzus,  leader  in  worship  of 

Artemis,  4. 
Miletus,  10  ;  St  Paul's  speech  in, 

25,  27,  29,  34,  128,  234. 
Miracles,      135      seq.,     .253  ;      in 

Fourth        Gospel,       277  -  290 

passim,  306. 
Mithras,  see  Mystery  religions. 
Modernity,  319-361  passim. 
Moffatt,  Dr  Jas.,  quoted,  39,  45, 

52,  58,  67. 
Montanism,  48,  341. 
Mystery   religions,    14,    45,    126, 

1895^/.,  206,  241,  348. 

Nestorius,  49. 

Nicodemus,    1 12   seq.,    121    seq., 

195,  201,  261,  265. 
Nicolaitans,  35  seq. 
Nicolas  of  Antioch,  37. 


Onesimus,    Bishop    of    Ephesus, 

48. 
Origen,  allegorising  of,  76. 


Papias  and  John  the  Presbyter,  43. 

Paul  (St),  his  visit  to  Ephesus, 
19  seq.  ;  stay  and  work  in 
Ephesus,  19-35  >  on  Orders  in 
Church,  41  ;  relation  to  author 
of  Fourth  Gospel,  54,  75,  78, 
88  seq.,  99,  309,  and  passim  ; 
mystic  doctrine  of,  127  seq., 
193  ;  on  forgiveness,  130  seq.  ; 
view  of  the  Universe,  148  ;  of 
Scripture,  149  ;  of  the  Spirit, 
153  seq.  ;  eschatology  of,  181 
seq.  ;  on  sacraments,  183-198; 
on  flesh,  211  ;  on  Judaism, 
217  seq.,  229  seq.  ;  on  Church 
and  World,  237  seq. ;  on  truth, 
266 ;  on  facts,  269,  332  ;  on 
liberty,  271;  on  kenosis,  300  ; 
"twice-born,"  320. 

Persian  invasions,  2,  8,  10. 

Peter,  St,  71  seq.,  84,  207,  267, 
288. 

Philo,  57,  59,  314. 

Phocsea,  early  importance  of,  2. 

Plato  (Platonic  teaching),  89  seq. , 
101  seq.,  147  seq.,  170,  25S, 
266,  311,  329. 

Plutarch,  17,  94.  125. 

Polycarp,  St,  48  seq. 

Prayer,  132  seq. 

Priscilla  (Prisca)  in  Ephesus,  20  ; 
greeting  to,  32. 

Psalms,  the,  145,  148,  189,  260, 
262,  269. 

Purgatory,  177. 

"  Q,'  96  se1- 

Ramsay,  Sir  W.,  quoted,  16. 

Renan,  284. 

Reville,  Albert,  285. 

Roman  Empire,  rule  of,  in  Asia 

Minor,  12,  125,  249,  353. 
Romans,  Epistle  to  the,  32,  231. 


362 


THE    EPHESIAN    GOSPEL 


Sabbath,  the,  226  seq. 
Sacraments,  the,  in  St  Paul  and  in 

Fourth  Gospel,  1S9-213 passim, 

281,  340  seq. 
Samaria,  the  woman  of,  113  seq., 

20S,  222,  265,  304. 
Samson,  145. 
Sanday,  Canon,  53. 
Schleiermacher,  100. 
Schweitzer,  Dr,  171. 
Scott,  E.  F.,  quoted,  59,  88,  159, 

234,  252. 
Scriptures,  interpretation  of,  149, 

229  seq. 
Sheol,  159  seq. 
Smyrna,  36,  48. 
Socrates,  100^.,  147. 
Spirit,  the,  in   Pauline  theology, 

82  ;  in  Fourth  Gospel,  141-162, 

261  seq.,  321  seq.,  348  seq. 


Synoptists,   see    Matthew,    Mark, 

Luke. 
Syro-Phcenician  woman,  215. 

Thomas,  St,  290. 

Timothy,  Epistles  to,  254. 

Titus,  Epistle  to,  254. 

Truth,   doctrine  of,  158  seq.,  243 

seq. ,  meanings  of,  257  seq. 
Tylor,  his  Primitive  Culture,  142. 

Virgin  Mother,  the,  33,  50,   211, 
285. 

Wendt,  H.  H.,  67. 
Westcott,  Dr  B.  F.,  96. 
Will  of  God,  devotion  to,  274  seq., 
29S  seq. 

Xenophon,  101  seq. 


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